Dr. Li and Elder Hou’s plan were to preach in the rural areas of Longchuan County from near to far, provide relief and to treat diseases. Their first destination was Liannan Village and Shuibei Village, which were very close to the county.

The three members of the Presbyterian Church hired a skewed donkey cart. Two pastors and the British man put large and small bags of medicine and food on the skewed cart. Zhang Bicheng saw that the cart was dirty and broken, as if it had just been unearthed from the tomb. The donkey pulling the cart was the size of a big dog, and its body was worn out by a circle, which looked pitiful and powerless. When he turned his head, he saw that the wooden wheel was slanted with the shaft. Both wheels were like this. As soon as the car moved, the ruts were twisting like snakes.

"Oh, can this car hold the three of us?" Zhang Bicheng exclaimed at the crooked wheel, "Will it fall apart halfway?"

"Don't worry, it's okay! How many things are you?" The driver standing next to the donkey put on his hat and laughed: "My car is more than a four-wheeled carriage."

"This is the case in China. It seems to fall apart at any time, but it can always run away." Dr. Li smiled and patted Zhang Bicheng's back, lifting the cloth curtain burning from bottom to top for him like flames, allowing him to get in.

The car started to walk, got off the Western Road, and turned on a dirt road. The car immediately turned into a sampan in the ocean, bumping up and down in the huge waves. The carriage tilted to the left, tilted to the right, and seemed to be uphill, and then turned downhill;

He lifted the curtain and looked out, and saw that the road under the car had really turned into a wave-like thing. The yellow mud was undulating under the wheels like flames, and it made a squeaking sound.

"Is there no better road here?" Zhang Bicheng retracted his head and made it. Because the carriage was tilting, he had to carry his hands behind him and grab the wooden board of the car.

"There is no road to go to the village, only dirt roads." Dr. Li smiled.

"Brother Zhang has seen the suburbs near the capital. There are naturally roads in the prosperous areas of our country," Elder Hou smiled and pointed at Zhang Bicheng and said, "Yesterday you said that Longchuan was living well, and I laughed. Only the few streets in the county town are very beautiful."

Dr. Li said: "Longchuan's life is not good, he is very poor. You can tell if you go around the countryside with us."

Zhang Bicheng smiled and felt very embarrassed. He asked, "When I came here by train, I didn't seem to see a village along the route."

Elder Hou spread his hands and said, "There were three large villages west of Longchuan, but because of resistance to building the railway, they were all razed to the ground three years ago."

Dr. Li added: "Not only is the village gone, but our church's five years of preaching efforts outside Longchuan City were destroyed."

"What happened?" Zhang Bicheng widened his eyes.

Dr. Li sighed and said, "Originally, our church and Catholic churches were there, but because the people were excited and had violent conflicts with the railway company and the sheriffs, the county magistrate asked our church pastors to go to the countryside to appease the people. As a result, the civil changes occurred. All the fourteen pastors and preachers in our church... all returned to the Tian family gloriously."

"So that's how it is!" Zhang Bicheng looked shocked and then said seriously: "They glorified God. Amen."

Elder Hou nodded and said, "So there are no big villages in the west of the county town, and the people are wandering around and their lives are becoming more and more difficult. There are also many people from Jiangxi and Chaozhou who come to make a living. However, because of the incident three years ago, our church was extremely short of pastors and preachers, so we had to put our strength in the county town, and we were unable to preach and establish churches in the countryside, and we could only do such things as preaching and ceremonies."

"So we have been praying to God, hoping that God can send more preachers and pastors to us." Dr. Li said, holding Zhang Bicheng's arm and said sincerely: "We really hope that you can stay here, the burden here is no lighter than that in the Qing Dynasty."

"Let me see." Zhang Bicheng nodded.

At this time, the car stopped and heard the driver shouting in front of him: "Doctor Li, elder, can you get down and help push the cart, so you can get stuck in a mud pit and can't move."

The three of them immediately got out of the car. The coachman in front pulled the donkey hard, Elder Hou held an umbrella for them, and Dr. Li and Zhang Bicheng stepped on the ankle-deep mud soup and struggled to lift the car.

The car finally came out of the mud pit. Dr. Li turned his head and said to Zhang Bicheng in surprise: "Why didn't you take off your shoes and jump off?"

Zhang Bicheng was stunned, and then he realized that Dr. Li and Elder Hou were both barefoot. He was surprised and wanted to come up from the mud pit. As a result, the man came up and his shoes were trapped in the mud pit. He had to turn his head and fish in the mud like fishing.

Everyone laughed together.

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Liannan Village is a small village not far from Dongjiang, only four or five miles away from the county town, very close. Although the donkey cart is not as fast as walking, it arrives in two hours.

When the three of them arrived at the entrance of the village, their legs were covered in mud. There was no way. The road was fertilized into something like paste. From time to time, they could not walk. The three of them had to walk with umbrellas and follow the car. When they arrived at the destination, Elder Hou, who tied the leather shoes and laces on his neck, asked with a smile: "Brother Zhang, how does Longchuan Soup taste like?"

The barefoot Zhang Bicheng was holding two mud-shaped shoes in his hand, and his face was full of a bitter smile.

"What is that? Are there any agricultural products?" Looking at the village in front, Zhang Bicheng raised the mud in his hand and shouted in question.

Dr. Li looked in the direction of Zhang Bicheng's finger and saw that outside the dark village house were white or yellow triangular sheds, until the person's waist was high. At first glance, it was as if Liannan Village was built in a dense vegetation group.

"This is a shack, which is inhabited." Dr. Li replied, then asked with a puzzled look: "Brother Zhang, is there no shack in the British Empire?"

"Hey, Brother Zhang is from the Hanlin Academy and is from a wealthy man. Even if he has it, he can't see it." Elder Hou said with a smile.

Because of curiosity, Zhang Bicheng ran over. Sure enough, the waist-high triangular shed was living in: outside was covered with straw mats and wood chips, and a wooden stick was used as a pillar. Below was either a rotten mat, or a grass leaf or something, there were several people lying or sitting inside, including old and young, men and women, and some people picked up some firewood and burned fire;

The smoke released by the wet wood ignited and a stinking smell in the entire shack area almost suffocated Zhang Bicheng. He coughed and covered his mouth and nose and took two steps back, causing the strange gaze of the boy who was burning water in the shack.

"Just like this, these people live? Is there no house?" Zhang Bicheng retreated to Dr. Li, who was pushing the broken car desperately.

"They are all refugees. Some of them are locals who escaped after their villages were burned down, some are bankrupt and landless farmers, or disabled or sick, and have no work in the city. Some are from other places and want to find a job in Longchuan." Elder Hou, who was holding an umbrella to hide the rain, answered calmly, as if he was talking about a very ordinary thing.

Dr. Li panted and pulled the car out of the mud for the next time, curled up his hands full of mud, wiped the sweat from his forehead with his cleaner wrist, and said panting: "There are more people recently. I have been driven out of Longchuan County these days. In fact, if it weren't for the bad time when you came, you would have seen so many shacks in the county."

"Why should I drive them out?" Zhang Bicheng asked.

"We want an election. The mayor said that the court would send adults, and there were reporters from major newspapers to come. This group of people did not have a fixed residence. If they lived in Longchuan County, they would throw them out for the time being, so they would be driven out." Dr. Li said.

"Sir, my fingers are gone, give me some money?" At this time, a woman in a roadside shack saw them. She got up from the ground, walked to them, and spread her three broken hands in front of Zhang Bicheng.

"This was cut off by a machine in a textile factory." Elder Hou explained.

Zhang Bicheng nodded and said, "I know that many female workers in London and Manchester are like this."

Dr. Li had no intention of giving money, and he said with a smile: "Don't you know me?"

"Pity, I'm a blind man, I'm lame and blind. Foreigner, give me some money, Jesus bless you!" Before the female worker could answer, another naked man crawled over from the mud soup on the ground: his eyes turned pale, his head was gone, and a big scalp on his head turned into a big blood-red scar. He was poured by the rain and looked particularly creepy.

Dr. Li walked over and said with a smile: "Old Li, it's me, don't pretend to be a cripple."

"Ah? Doctor Li? You are here today!" The blind man was stunned when he heard this, his eyes rolled down suddenly, and he saw who it was. He was startled first, then smiled embarrassedly, and climbed up from the ground with mud all over his body.

"I just saw this tall and big foreigner. Come over and ask for some money, but I didn't see you." The blind man's mouth, which had cracked a few teeth, smiled.

Dr. Li did not respond, but reached out to pinch his cheek, let his mouth open, then looked at the teeth inside, frowned and asked, "Why is your face swollen? Do you still have toothache? Last time I pulled a bad tooth for you, but one was also broken. You said I was reluctant to let it go. Now that the bad tooth has not caused trouble for you, right?"

"What's going on with this guy?" Zhang Bicheng asked, looking at the man with a big piece of scalp.

"He turned out to be working in Zhangqijie Factory. This man didn't want to cut his braids. One time the braids were stirred in by a machine, and he was pulled on the iron shaft that was slammed above his head. When he was rescued, he lost his scalp." Elder Hou spread his hands and sighed: "You foreign machines are very good at making money, but hurting and killing people are also very good at killing people. Who would be killed by accident? In the past, we were all farmers here, and they were holding seedlings and bamboo baskets in their hands. Who had heard of the fact that they would disappear with the blink of an eye?"

"Doctor Li is here! Doctor Li is here!" The female worker who lacked fingers was already shouting: "Whoever has any illness is here, hurry up! Ah, who has some strength to help push the cart."

As a result, Dr. Li and his team entered the village surrounded by a group of stinky poor people. They helped them get the car into the village. Finally, there were three people fighting against the yellow mud that was as sticky as paste.

In Zhang Bicheng's eyes, the buildings in this village are actually not much better than shacks. There is no new building. It was built many years ago. It was etched by time and turned from head to toe to black, and it was shaking. Many broken houses even fell toward the middle of the street. Zhang Bicheng was so scared that Zhang Bicheng hid, and the elder Hou behind laughed: "Brother Zhang, I said, that house cannot be destroyed! Don't look at the rags, but can always hold on. This is our characteristic."

There were two Presbyterian colleagues working hard to preach the gospel on the street, and they shouted: "We are all going to hell and perish. It was Jesus who saved us with His precious blood. Because God loved us, he gave His only Son, our king, Jesus Christ, to die for us!"

Although both preachers worked very hard, because the weather was not good and it was raining, they stood under the small shed that had been built to preach. There were only seven or eight people listening, as if a group of people were having a meeting around the table. No matter how many people were, they had to stand outside the shed to get wet in the rain.

Pointing to a large mansion with cranes ahead, Dr. Li said, "The front is the home of the village chief Brother Zhang Lihuan. We usually set up places for relief and treatment in his home."

Zhang Bicheng looked at it and saw that the shell of this large mansion turned black, but it was completely repaired with bricks, and there was no thatch on it as a roof. Instead, it was made of tiles, which looked slightly neat than other houses.

A group of people went into Zhang Lihuan's home. This was a courtyard house with houses built on all sides, with eaves connected into one, and a square patio in the middle. A group of people were lined up under the eaves and lined up to the door of the wing room. In the wing room, two nurses under Dr. Li's subordinates were checking and treating one person after another.

"Doctor Li, are you here? Elder Hou, you are okay!" Zhang Lihuan greeted him with a smile, and then was stunned: "Who is this foreign friend?"

"It was Brother Zhang Bicheng sent from the headquarters." Dr. Li replied, then turned to the wing room and asked, "Xiao Li, Xiao Wang, are you busy these two days?"

"It's okay!" The two people in the wing room immediately replied: "But there are a few people we can't treat, so we have to ask you to come and have a look."

"Is there anyone who needs eye surgery?" Dr. Li asked. Only he has the ability to do such large-scale surgery.

"I have registered those people with difficult and complicated diseases. Go and call them later." Village Chief Zhang answered for them, and then asked Dr. Li and the others to sit in the house for a rest: "Doctor Li, have you eaten? Why are you too anxious? After lunch first and then work."

"Do you have any shoes for this foreign brother?" Elder Hou asked the village chief.

"Yes! Yes! Yes!" The village chief agreed very simply, but looked down at Zhang Bicheng's feet and was shocked: "Such big feet?! No! No!"

After saying that, Village Chief Zhang immediately called his family to cook, and then brought Zhang Bicheng's mud balls for his daughter to wash it by the river. Elder Hou and Dr. Li seemed to be familiar with them, and they were both talking and laughing, and Dr. Li couldn't sit still after sitting in the living room for a while. He rushed to the corridor and asked the poor people who were waiting for medical treatment one by one, and did their work for their subordinates.

Elder Hou couldn't sit still. He took out a stack of gospel leaflets from his luggage and wanted to go to the street to distribute them. Zhang Bicheng naturally had to follow him, but Elder Hou held him down and smiled and said, "Brother Zhang, you can rest here first. Who told you to jump on the dirt road and not take off your shoes? Your feet are so big, and we don't have suitable shoes. Let's wait for your shoes to be washed clean by Lao Zhang's daughter."

Everyone was busy, and Zhang Bicheng didn't want to sit in the living room. He walked to the door barefoot and stood there watching the rain falling in the patio. He was still listening to the sound of dingdong dong in his ears, which was very wonderful.

He turned around and found that there was a large water tank beside him. The rainwater flowing from the eaves made a wonderful sound unique to the rainy days in the south. When he walked closer, he saw that the inner wall of the water tank was already green, full of water plants and moss. Some tadpoles were swimming inside, which looked poetic and extremely interesting.

At this time, the village chief came over with a wooden barrel and smiled and said to Zhang Bicheng: "Brothers, I'm sorry, there are too many things at home, I'll neglect you."

"It's okay!" Zhang Bicheng shook his hand and said, then pointed to the water tank and said, "Is this the tank where you raise fish? It's very beautiful."

The village chief nodded in surprise, without making any noise, took out a scoop from the wooden barrel and knocked on the water tank. The tadpoles immediately hid in the water plants. The village chief scooped water on it and filled the wooden barrel and turned around and left. Then in front of Zhang Bicheng's eyes, he poured the water into the cooking pot, turned his head and smiled: "Bove you water, tea, and drive away the cold!"

"Ah? That water cannot be drunk!" Zhang Bicheng was stunned for a long time before screaming.

"What's wrong?" Dr. Li ran over.

Zhang Bicheng pointed to the water tank and shouted: "The water tank is filled with rainwater, and there are tadpoles. He actually used it to make tea!"

The village chief scratched his scalp and said in confusion: "It's rainwater. Rainwater is known as rootless water, isn't it the cleanest?"

"How could it be?! There are water plants and tadpoles!" Zhang Bicheng's eyes were as bright as a bronze bell.

"Even tadpoles can live, people can drink them even more, and they even boil." The village chief laughed.

Dr. Li also smiled and patted Zhang Bicheng's arm and said, "In fact, it is best to use alum to precipitate for a few days, and then filter it with a cloth, but is this the countryside? There is not so much attention."

After saying that, he spread his hands and said, "I have also grown up drinking this kind of water since I was a child, there is no problem."

"Are you really a medical school graduate?" Zhang Bicheng asked cautiously.
Chapter completed!