Ye Shengtao, 1894 10 was born in Hangqiao Lane, Suzhou City, Jiangsu Province. Shengtao is his word.
Ye Jia runs a small cloth shop called Xie Ji, just around the corner of the suspension bridge.
Ye Shengtao's father, Ye Renbo, is a man who knows the root and the bottom, that is, he is in charge of accounts. People usually call him "accountant" or "Mr. Accountant". He mainly collects rent from a landlord named Wu. In addition, some large families will invite him to take care of the accounts temporarily when the wedding, funeral and celebration are over. In addition to parents and two sisters, Ye Shengtao's family also has a grandmother. The life of a family of seven depends entirely on my father's meager income, and life is still a little tight. However, despite this, the problem of food and clothing can still be worry-free. Ye Shengtao's father is kind and upright, and his mother is kind-hearted, devoted to housekeeping and thrifty. Ye Shengtao is deeply influenced by his parents' morality. He wants to be like his parents.
Ye Shengtao was loved by his parents when he was a child. Because he was the only boy in the family, his parents placed great hopes on him. They look forward to their son's success in the future with the imperial examination. In order to make his son famous, Ye Renbo asked Ye Shengtao to start reading and practicing calligraphy at the age of three. By the age of six, Ye Shengtao had been literate for about 3,000 years, and his handwriting was quite beautiful. Zhu Can didn't read much, but his stomach was full of riddles, poems and children's songs handed down from generation to generation, and he often told them to his son. The riddles circulating in the south of Jiangsu Province in China are very informative and interesting. Ye Shengtao is very interested in guessing riddles, from which he is enlightened by wisdom. Those sweet ancient poems are all written by Hua Mao, which are concise and rich in meaning. Ye Shengtao can recite a lot. Children's songs, in particular, are vivid in image, fantastic in imagination and beautiful in rhythm, which fascinates Ye Shengtao. He often hums and smiles. Such as "fireflies, red every night; Fly west, fly east ... Shake, shake, shake to Waipo Bridge. Grandma calls me a good baby. A bag of sugar, a bag of fruit, and a cake, etc. It's really interesting. No wonder Ye Shengtao is so excited!
In the second year after the Reform Movement of 1898 (1899), when Ye Shengtao was six years old, his father sent him to a private school. Miss Huang, a well-known local teacher, writes well. Ye Renbo entrusted his son to such a well-known elder, which was very reassuring. The father is very strict with his son. When he came home from school, he urged him to review his lessons and recite the text, and set a family rule that "you can't eat when you are ripe." Fortunately, Ye Shengtao studied consciously and had a strong memory. There was no case that he could not eat because he couldn't recite books. In Mr. Huang's place, Ye Shengtao studied the Holy Amethyst, Hundred Family Names and Thousand Characters. A year later, Ye Shengtao came to Gujia Garden at the southeast end of Suspension Bridge Lane and read The Four Books, The Book of Songs and The Book of Changes with an old gentleman named Rizo. Teacher Zhang is meticulous in teaching and extremely strict with his students. He stipulates that students must read and recite what they have learned, or they will be punished with a ruler. Ye Shengtao dare not slack off in his studies. He absorbed himself in reading and recited fluently.
Ye Renbo encouraged his son to be familiar with the books of sages, but because of his poor family, he did not advocate keeping his children in the study like rich children. He thought it was pragmatic to take them out for a run, get familiar with society and get to know all kinds of people and things in society. It is better to be illiterate than sad. With this traditional concept, Ye Renbo asked his son to go out with relatives to celebrate the New Year, celebrate his birthday and hold a wedding reception. Tomb-Sweeping Day went to the countryside to see his ancestral grave, and went to the countryside to see the rent collection in autumn. All this has greatly broadened Ye Shengtao's horizons and influenced him invisibly. Ye Shengtao appreciated the simplicity of Suzhou folk customs when he was a child, and he also had a continuous concern for the sufferings of the people. Ye Shengtao lived in Wudi with a strong cultural atmosphere since childhood. Liancheng's distant mountains are related to water, pavilions, temples and even road names. Even plaques, arches or bridges have legends. Dad always takes him to see and tell him. Moreover, after returning home, he was asked to recall the order of his visit and make a diary-like record as a writing training before "writing".
Ye Shengtao began to write when he was eight years old. The teacher's topic is "Climbing high and looking far, feeling inferior". Before writing, he was reminded that "this should be said to be about learning". Ye Shengtao wrote more than eighty words according to the teacher's instructions. When the teacher saw that his brush was square, his sentences were fluent and his reasoning was fluent, he kept praising him. He was particularly satisfied with the end of the article, "I am noble, but I am poor in knowledge", and could not help but draw two circles next to the words "two" and "Hu" in red. Ye Shengtao happily took the composition book home to his father, who smiled happily when he saw that his son was sensitive, studious and talented. After nearly two years of hard study, Ye Shengtao has made great progress and can write a history of Confucian classics or current affairs of more than 300 words. The father earnestly hoped that his son would grow up quickly. In order to study better, he was admitted to a scholar and sent Ye Shengtao to another private school. His father taught him to treat his study with the perseverance of climbing high, just as he said in "Climbing high and feeling inferior". Ye Shengtao understands his father's expectations and is determined to study hard and forge ahead.
In order to increase his son's knowledge of literature and history, his father took him to a teahouse to listen to books and Kunqu opera. Ye Shengtao listened to many books when he was a child, such as Pearl Tower, golden phoenix, San Xiao and Xiang Qiu, Wu Wen, as well as such great books as Romance of the Three Kingdoms, Jin Ping Mei, Water Margin and Hero. Some of these books have been listened to more than once, at most three or four times. The storyteller, waving a paper fan and flapping his hands to wake up the wood, told the story vividly, and the voices of various characters were imitated vividly, highlighting different personalities. Hearing the highlights, Ye Shengtao is often drawn by the plot of joys and sorrows. Sometimes he shows a painful expression because of grief and indignation, and sometimes he smiles with joy and is completely intoxicated. Ye Shengtao prefers to listen to Kunqu opera, with elegant lyrics and beautiful syllables. At that time, the melody that was soft and moist, sometimes sad and depressed, sometimes loud and magnificent, and sometimes sad and sad captured his heart, which made him never tire of listening to it, and even thought of becoming a Kunqu opera actor. Influenced by Suzhou regional culture, his artistic aesthetic ability has been improved. This kind of alternative education class provided by his father made him learn knowledge that he could not learn in any private school, and cultivated his vision of observing the real society. Ye Shengtao's father combined family, private school and society. This kind of education is very open-minded and has benefited children a lot.
Ye Shengtao's six-year private school life has passed, and his life will enter another stage from childhood.
1906, the "Changyuanwu Public Higher Primary School" named after Changzhou County, Yuanhe County and Wuxian County in Suzhou was founded, and Ye Shengtao passed this school with excellent results.
Most of the teachers in this primary school are foreign students who have just returned from Japan, including Zhang, who teaches singing and history, Zhu Suiying, who teaches Chinese, Gong Gengyu, who teaches natural history and arithmetic, and Du Anbo, who teaches English. They are full of enthusiasm for the new educational cause, and their lectures are also very pleasant, showing a wide range of knowledge, and Ye Shengtao listened with relish. He gained an unprecedented new understanding from the revolutionary thought that the teacher talked about. Mr. Zhang educates students in class and says: "The earth cannot be separated from people, and people cannot be separated from things. To talk about personnel, we must predict geography. If you want to be patriotic, you must first love the countryside and understand the history of the countryside and the great achievements of celebrities. To be patriotic, we must first understand China's natural geography and heroes of past dynasties. " Ye Shengtao got the message and chewed the patriotic sense of justice that the teacher said. He learned to combine patriotism with his love for mountains, rivers and plants in his hometown, and to understand and be familiar with the history of great achievements made by Ying Jie, a famous person in previous dynasties. Teachers integrate revolutionary ideological education into knowledge teaching. For example, the clear spring moistened Ye Shengtao's heart and left him an unforgettable impression.