The first snow after winter made Chang'an City covered in silver. After the snow, pedestrians and carriages shuttled back and forth on the streets. Among the pedestrians who were coming and going, Yuwen Wen, who was leaving the palace in a hurry, walked forward while looking down at the ground, as if looking for copper coins falling on the ground.

However, what Yuwen Wen was looking for was horse manure.

He wanted to see how long the horse manure stayed in the streets in Chang'an City.

A carriage passed by and stopped beside the shop ahead. The owner got out of the car, hung a bamboo basket around the neck of the old horse of the carriage, and then turned to the carriage to unload the goods.

The old horse was leisurely eating the hay in the basket, and after a while, he sniffed happily and began to shit.

Although there was a feces hanging on the back of the butt, it was obvious that the feces could not contain all the horse manure. Yuwen Wen watched a few pieces of horse manure rubbed through the feces and fell on the ground. It was extremely fresh and steaming.

He stopped and stood not far away, looking at the carriage and the piles of horse manure on the ground.

The owner was busy unloading the goods and then settled the accounts with the store. It seemed that the two were old acquaintances and chatted. After a while, the money and goods were cleared. The owner smiled and weighed the money bag, put it in his arms, then got on the car and left.

Leaves steaming horse manure.

Seeing this, Yuwen Wen silently took out his pocket watch, looked at the time, and behind him, the eunuch Li Sanjiu, who accompanied him out of the palace, also looked at the pocket watch in his hand.

The casual guards were guarding around, pretending that they didn't know what the emperor was doing.

After putting away his pocket watch, Yuwen Wen began to look around to avoid passing pedestrians seeing that he was paying attention to a few pieces of horse manure.

The sunlight shone through the clouds and sprinkled on Yuwen Wen's face. He looked at the bright sky and began to think about things.

The city in the world, no matter how big or small, will face a very serious sanitation problem: people and animals urinate and defecate anywhere, making the streets in the city smelly.

Although decent cities will have drainage channels, with the city management level of this era, they are basically allowed to urinate and defecate anywhere.

In summer and autumn, high temperatures and rainfall cause fishy sewage to spread everywhere, the ground is filled with shit, urine and filth, and mud, which makes the city hygiene very poor and can easily cause epidemic diseases.

This situation was like this before modern times, both in China and abroad. Whether it was the romantic capital of Paris or the Sijiu City under the feet of the emperor, it was common to urinate and defecate anywhere. The residents along the street even poured the yellow and white things in the shit basin onto the street.

The sanitation conditions of cities in small places are poor. If a plague occurs, about a thousand people will die of illness. If a large metropolis like Chang'an, which live in hundreds of thousands of people, is amazing once a plague occurs.

Since Yuwen Wen succeeded to the throne, he has been very dedicated to the rectification of Chang'an's appearance. He has also made great efforts to build various sewage channels, sewers, and "public toilets". He has strictly managed the appearance with the help of the police system.

Therefore, in Chang'an, no one dares to urinate or defecate on the street, or pour feces and urine directly into the street, which greatly improves the hygiene.

However, people are easy to manage, but livestock are difficult to manage. Not to mention cattle, sheep, pigs, chickens, ducks, geese, a large number of horses entering and leaving Chang'an every day will shit, which is a huge challenge for city appearance managers.

Even if every horse is forced to hang a feces on the edge of its butt, it can only relieve it, but not cure it.

If you only care about people and livestock, the city appearance is as bad as that. Chang'an City has a large number of horses, which are responsible for heavy transportation and cart pulling, and the standard equipment of official cars - ox carts, which produce a lot of feces every day, even more than human feces.

Regardless, the hygiene problem is still serious.

So, how to manage it?

The management method is very simple. If the cow is fined, the horse will be fined if it is shitting on the street. The fine cannot be low. The amount must be made to make the cow, and the owner of the horse feels that it is cutting the flesh.

This method is good, but it is very troublesome to implement and the cost is not low.

First of all, there must be a team similar to "urban management". Every day, I patrol the streets and streets of various lifangs and horses, and I will chase them and fine them if I find cows and horses shit everywhere. This job cannot be taken by the patrol police, otherwise it will seriously interfere with the police's job in maintaining public order.

Secondly, each "urban management" team must not have a small number of people, otherwise, facing the "troubled people", one or two weak people will probably not be able to suppress them. Moreover, there are more people and more supervision, so as not to embezzle the fines.

Third, even if there are many people in "urban management", they will have a headache if they encounter special groups.

What is a special group? Of course, it is a family of officials, especially those powerful families. A large group of people follow him when he goes out. There are so many mounts who shit in the street. Where can the small "urban management" have the courage to catch up and fine it?

Chang'an is the capital of the country, with many powerful people as many as dogs and playing dandy walks all over the ground. In the eyes of these people, the small "urban management" may not be as good as horse manure, so how can they "enforce the law"?

Although the powerful and powerful children did not dare to be arrogant and beat people in the streets, the humble "urban management" dared not provoke officials because the other party took revenge afterwards, and they might have their whole family unlucky.

This is a reality. It is very feasible to spend money to maintain a large-scale "urban management" team to stop cows and horses from shitting in the street.

So, Yousi thought of another way.

"Look, there is here, there!"

A few young children's voices attracted Yu Wen Wen's attention. He followed the sound and saw a few children flashing on the street ahead.

There are men and women, about six or seven years old, wearing many patches, white-washed clothes, old cloth shoes on their feet, cloth bags, wooden pieces in their hands, and a branch in their hands.

Seeing the piles of fresh horse manure on the ground, I quickly walked over and skillfully used branches to "lift" the horse manure onto the wood chips used as shovels, and then poured them into a cloth bag.

The cloth bags were bulging, and it seemed that they had already contained horse manure before, while the cloth bags in their hands seemed to have "invested" a lot.

The horse manure left on the ground disappeared, leaving only faint traces, like morning dew, disappeared not long after its birth.

The feces are like morning dew, and I think this is the case.

Yuwen Wen was about to take out his pocket watch to watch the time, but he focused on the children, and then stopped moving.

These children wear ripped cloth shoes, and you can also see the toes exposed on the front of the shoes, and the clothes on their bodies are covered with many patches. Whether men or women, their complexions are slightly yellow, which seems to be not very nutritious.

The clothes full of patches looked a little thin. Now that winter is just beginning, they may still be able to bear it, but it may be colder, it may be difficult.

"Quick, there are horses over there shit again!!"

The children cheered and ran forward quickly. Yuwen Wen suddenly felt a little uncomfortable when he looked at their departure backs.

In Chang'an City, there are children under the feet of the emperor who are not warm or full of food...

What kind of prosperity is this...

Yuwen Wen was a little confused as he thought about it. Seeing this, Li Sanjiu, who was beside him, asked in a low voice: "Your Majesty?"

"Hmm? What's the matter?"

"Time is five minutes and thirty seconds."

"Hmm? Yes, not bad, not bad, this is a good method."

Yuwen Wen put away his thoughts and continued to move forward, and Li Sanjiu followed silently.

In order to effectively manage the appearance of Chang'an and solve the problem of cattle, horses and other livestock shit everywhere, the company came up with two solutions. First, set up "inspection posts" to inspect cattle and horses at each city gate and main intersections in the city.

Every cow, horse, and behind the butt must have a feces bag. If not, each cow or horse will be fined 100 yuan.

In this way, it can effectively improve the cow and horses' manure hanging, and set up posts at city gates and main intersections to check for manure, which will save manpower and make officials consciously abide by this regulation.

But this method is not the root cause, so another one has to be added.

The government purchased feces, cows, horses, pigs, dogs, sheep manure, etc. for a fee, one penny per pound.

In this way, many people spontaneously collect feces left behind on the street. For poor families, mobilizing their children to pick up feces on the street is also a way to get income.

Even if you only earn a few cents a day, you will make a profit.

For the government, although it costs money, it can ensure that the feces on the streets are cleaned up in time. Overall, it is more cost-effective than maintaining a large-scale urban appearance management team.

Today, Yuwen Wen witnessed the "survival time" of several pieces of horse manure, and truly felt the effectiveness of this paid purchase of feces, but looking at the worn-out children, he was a little silent.

It is obvious that the so-called "prosperity" during the Mingde period only exists in the memorials of officials. As the emperor, Yuwen Wen had a long way to go.

The prosperous era is just an adjective now, and it is still a relatively exaggerated type, not a fact.

In Chang'an City, there are children who lack food and clothing, not to mention elsewhere.

Of course, Yuwen Wen would not blame himself too much, because even if the poverty problem cannot be completely solved in future generations, how can he solve it?

However, he cannot and should not be immersed in the sound of praise, feels good about himself, thinking that now is really a "bright era of virtue and prosperity" and can rest assured.

Immersed in the prosperous Kaiyuan era, Emperor Ming Li Longji of Tang Dynasty, became lazy, so he enjoyed his life, played with his daughter-in-law, and appointed a slander. What was the final outcome?

Yuwen Wen looked at the street scene in front of him and sighed: "It's a lesson from the past!"
Chapter completed!