Lord: Start with a book of Water Margin

Chapter 77 Silk Shop (Li Wangshi)

Zhao Yuanli said: "Master, Li Gu from the bone carving workshop in the village, Li Er from the jewelry shop, and Li Wang from the silk shop have all given messages. Where should we go first?"

Zhao Zhen said: "What did you say?"

Zhao Yuanli said: "Li Guyan said that the bone bows have been polished and a few bone carvings have been made; Li Erchu's jewelry shop has opened; Li Wang's silk and satin shop has also opened, but there is no profit, but more withdrawals. A sum of silver. I said there were few people making clothes, but I collected a lot of silkworm cocoons."

After hearing this, Zhao Zhen said: "Then let's go to the silk shop first."

The two went to a silk and satin shop. Unlike the small courtyards of farmers elsewhere, there was no courtyard wall along the street, but a row of four houses built as storefronts. The row behind them was used as daily residence. Li Xiaoer and his wife moved here. The left and right wings were used as warehouses.

Entering the silk and satin shop, there were more than thirty pieces of silk and satin of various colors placed in the middle of the counter, and some coarse cloths were placed on the left counter for selection. The two rooms on the right are tailoring and sewing places, where Mr. Li is currently sewing new clothes. There were also three or five women there, each with his head down, sewing.

After seeing the two of them enter the shop, Mrs. Li came over to see Li.

Zhao Zhen said: "Wang Qiao is in charge, but is he worried about not making a profit?"

Wang Qiao looked a little nervous and said: "Master, not many villagers come to buy silk and satin in the silk and satin shop now. It has been open for half a month and only 2 pieces of coarse cloth have been sold, and there is not a single one who can make clothes.

Now the first batch of silkworms has spun cocoons, but no one in the village knows how to reel them, so they all sent the cocoons to the shop and collected them as promised. More than 5000 kilograms of fresh silkworm cocoons were collected and made into dried cocoons. Now they are all made into dried cocoons, weighing about 2500 kilograms, and about 500 kilograms of silk can be reeled out.

They were all placed in the side room. I asked the farmer and found out that raising silkworms was not too difficult according to the instructions. I just fed the silkworms and cleaned the silkworm room every day, which did not delay the farming time. The income from one crop of silkworm cocoons is 700 Wen. From April to October every year, four or five crops can be cultivated depending on the number of mulberry leaves.

Seeing the profits, many villagers want to raise silkworms. Nowadays, many people have set aside their side rooms to make silkworm rooms. There are ready-made mulberry forests in Liangcun, Zhangzhuang, and Tianzhuang, and people have come to buy silkworm seeds.

Fortunately now, I can organize people to reel and weave the cocoons I collected. I'm afraid there will be a backlog if there are more cocoons in the future. "

Zhao Zhen said: "Is reeling troublesome?"

Wang Qiao said: "In fact, it is not difficult. You can soak the cocoons in hot soup, draw the silk with your hands, and roll it into a silk frame. It just takes a little longer. There is also a hand-operated silk reeling machine, which is much faster. A copper coin with a square inside and a round outside is placed on the small pot of the cocoon. Thread the thread through the coin so that the cocoon threads merge together and are twisted onto the silk frame.

I asked Butler Zhao to borrow a carpenter, and now I have built ten. I heard that there is already a pedal reeling car, but I have never seen it. I heard that when reeling, you can free up both hands to thread and add yarn, and the speed is much faster than a hand-operated reeling car. At the same time, the cooked cocoons can be moved into a warm water basin for reeling, and a charcoal brazier can be placed under the silk frame to dry the reeled raw silk immediately.

I see that silk reeling is time-consuming and there is no big profit to be made, so I would like to teach the villagers and only collect raw silk from now on. This can not only increase the villagers' income, but also reduce the backlog in the shop. I can even weave silk and satin into them, and collect them according to their quality. Come up. From now on, the shop will still only make ready-made clothes and embroidery according to the owner's requirements. It can also do some printing and dyeing, and weave some silks and satins with good patterns. "

Zhao Zhen nodded and said: "I will also go to the outside world to find out if there is such a silk reeling car as you mentioned."

Wang Qiao heard this and said: "If there is a pedal reeling machine, we can raise more silkworms in the future. Not only that, it will be better if there are good weavers in the future and set up a weaving workshop to specialize in this."

Zhao Zhen listened and nodded. The idea was indeed a good one, but unfortunately the conditions were not met yet. The Weaver Girl also has to search slowly, and now she can only weave some plain brocade.

While talking, Wang Qiao led Zhao Zhen to the backyard. A dozen women were reeling silk, and there were many people surrounding them. Wang Qiao grabbed a handful of silkworm cocoons from the bag, held it in his hand, and said to Zhao Zhen: "Master, look at these, these are the best cocoons."

Then he pointed to the silkworm cocoons in another frame next to him and said: "Those are inferior silkworm cocoons. They cannot be reeled or are not easy to reel. Although they cannot be reeled, they can be used as silk cotton and silk just like silkworm clothes." Spinning raw materials.”

As he spoke, he opened a cocoon and explained to Zhao Zhenxiang the uses of the cocoon coat, cocoon layer and pupa lining in detail.

Only then did Zhao Zhen realize that only the silkworm layer can be reeled, not the entire cocoon. Reeling requires cocoon peeling, cocoon selection, and cocoon cooking before the silk can be extracted from the cocoon through a reeling car. While demonstrating, the woman reeling the silk taught the people around her how to unravel, organize, gather, sheath, unwind, add threads and add threads when the cocoon is finished reeling or decapitated midway, and even The winding and drying of raw silk are demonstrated one by one.

From time to time, people would go to the silk reeling cart to experience it. Zhao Zhen watched it from the side. The women Wang Qiao found really taught them carefully. After watching it from the side, he felt like they knew it.

After watching the instruction on silk reeling, Zhao Zhen returned to the front shop. Zhao Zhen said: "Since we have begun to teach silk reeling, we don't need to worry about the pedal reeling carts for now. We still need to make more hand-operated reeling carts. Yuanli, you ask the carpenters to make a batch of reeling carts. There will be no wood on the mountain." Young master, give one to everyone who has learned it. When a pedal reeling machine is available in the future, if anyone is willing to use it, just make it and let them buy it."

Zhao Yuanli listened and nodded in agreement. He said: "Don't worry, owner, this hand-operated silk reeling machine is simple to make. It will be used by all the sericulture farmers in the next batch of cocoons."

Wang Qiao on the side also looked happy after hearing this.

Zhao Zhen said: "Yuanli, you write a batch of vouchers, stamp them all with my seal, and send them to Wang Qiao." Then he said to Wang Qiao, "Wang Li, if you take these vouchers, anyone who learns how to reel silk will Give one to every household. It means that with this, you can go to my village to exchange for a hand-operated silk reeling cart."

After thinking about it, Zhao Zhen said to Zhao Yuanli: "Both taverns in the village have posted notices to explain this matter."

Zhao Yuanli and Wang Qiao responded.

Zhao Zhen asked Wang Qiao: "Li Wang, is there anything else you can do now?"

Wang Qiao led Zhao Zhen to the tailoring place on the east side and said, "Master of the village, come and see, these are the clothes that the master of the village has made for the heroes of the village. In five days, they will be complete."

Zhao Zhen picked up a light blue lock-pattern cross-collar shirt and looked at it. It was made of fine brocade, which was light and breathable and had dense stitches. There is also a moon-white silk tunic, two pairs of shoes, socks, and trousers.

Zhao Zhen nodded with satisfaction and said to Wang Qiao: "Yes, they are all made and sent to the village."

Wang Qiao agreed and led Zhao Zhen a few steps forward. It was where Wang Qiao was cutting clothes. He pointed at the clothes on the table and said: "Master, this is the emerald blue ten-piece brocade skirt made for Bai Xiaoniang. The green flash red satin blouse is finished now, but do you want to send it to the village now?"

Zhao Zhen said: "We can send them to the village together in five days."

Wang Qiao agreed.

After talking with Wang Qiao, Zhao Zhen and Zhao Yuanli returned to the village.

After dealing with the blacksmith shop and silk shop, Zhao Zhen took a look at his attributes. His main occupation, manor owner, gained a lot of experience.

　Happy New Year to everyone.

　　Good health and abundant wealth.

　　I have been busy moving in the past two days, so I am sorry for not updating in time.

　　

　

(End of this chapter)