Lin Gao Qiming

Chapter 857 Silk
But the bankruptcy of the Shen family was not due to the bad market for raw silk, but the disease of silkworms.

"Last year, the young ones who were raising silkworms were infected with silkworm disease, and they had no harvest for the whole year," the man said with a sad face, "so they lost their money. Please ask the master to take them in."

Most silkworm diseases are caused by viruses. The environment where silkworms are raised is closed and the density of silkworms is very high. If the work of cleaning and disinfection is not done well, various silkworm diseases will easily break out.Traditional sericulture also had its own way of dealing with silkworm diseases, but at that time there was still a lack of disinfection concepts, so it was not uncommon for similar outbreaks of silkworm disease to cause reduced or even no harvest.

Once a large-scale disease occurs, there is a danger of losing everything for silkworm farmers.

It seems that sericulture is also "high risk and high return" for farmers, which is not as simple as I thought.Zhao Yingong became interested.Since we want to do business in this line of business, we must first inquire as clearly as possible.

Now I asked him to talk about the specific process of raising silkworms, but sericulture is a women's monopoly in rural areas.Girls start to learn to raise silkworms from the age of twelve or thirteen.From the "seed protection" in the twelfth lunar month, to the hatching of the "stall birds" in the spring, to the "three sleeps", "out of the fire", "up the mountain" of silkworms, and even cocoon drying and silk reeling, all are done by women.Although he knew it, he was afraid that what he said would not be clear, or even wrong, so he asked his wife to speak.

"My servant has seen the master." The woman was born beautiful, and she spoke a Hangzhou dialect with both northern and southern accents - not very different from the modern Hangzhou dialect. Zhao Yingong listened to it and said with a smile, "Get up, you what is it call?"

"Women in the country don't have a name. The maidservant's maiden name is Wang, Xingsi. Everyone used to call me Wang Siniang. If the master wants to be called a servant girl, he can be called a servant girl or whatever." The woman speaks very cleverly—the peasant girls in Jiangnan not only have to farm and raise silkworms, but also from time to time. You have to "go to the streets" to peddle, so your speaking knowledge is not bad.

Wang Siniang first talked about the process of raising silkworms. From hatching to cocooning, it takes 28 to [-] days.There is a time for feeding silkworms, and mulberry leaves must be added in time. Even in the middle of the night, you have to get up to feed, and there is no delay.Silkworm excrement and remaining mulberry leaf residues should be cleaned up at all times, otherwise it is easy to be infected with silkworm disease.Sericulture is very demanding on temperature, that is, it must be kept warm, not too hot, and not ventilated, so the places where silkworms are raised are always closed and not ventilated.When the temperature is slightly lower, a fire should be fired to keep warm.And when the silkworms "go up the mountain", a brazier should be built under the silkworm foil-this can speed up the silkworm's spinning, and make the silkworms spit out as dry as possible, which is conducive to improving the quality of the silkworm cocoons.However, fires were often made, so the candles had to be very careful, because it was not uncommon for silkworms to raise fires and eventually cause fires.

Zhao Yingong is very familiar with the allusion of "silkworm room" - it seems that this method of raising silkworms has been very mature in the Qin and Han Dynasties.

Throughout March and April, the Sericulture House was basically inactive. There were very few pedestrians in the village. Neighbors and relatives stopped walking with each other, and red paper was pasted in front of every house.Even the government will not go to the countryside during this period.

Most of the cocoons received are reeled and sold by silkworm farmers themselves, and some cocoons are sold directly to the 'cocoon shop'.But this is due to lack of manpower or some other reasons.

"Why do you have to make raw silk yourself?" Zhao Yingong asked.

"Going to the cocoon shop to sell too many silkworm cocoon 'flower heads', the country people always suffer." Wang Siniang said that the cocoon shop must have government teeth, so it is very monopolistic, and there is a special "office" in the same industry, and the new cocoon is listed. , Peer discussion, which day to open the scale, which day to stop.The purchase price is also negotiated, and you are not allowed to raise the price yourself.The bargain price is always low every year.

Not to mention the low price, there are still various "tricks" when harvesting cocoons, either because they think the cocoons are "wet", or they insist on the weight.The worst thing is that in order to further lower the price, the cocoon shop will suddenly close the cocoon store for a few days at the critical moment when a large number of silkworm cocoons are on the market, and stop collecting cocoons.

"Why do you want to stop receiving it?"

Wang Siniang said: "After the cocoon is collected, I can't afford to wait. If the silk is not reeled or sold, it will be left there. Once the chrysalis inside is bitten off, it will be worthless. The country people can only sell it at a low price."

I see!Zhao Yingong thinks that this is actually a man-made "difficulty in selling cocoons", which makes the purchase price plummet. There were many such tricks in the old time and space.

Zhao Yingong asked again: "Cocoon Bank bought cocoons, how do we sell them?"

"I reeled the silk myself and sold it to the silk merchants. In and outside Hangzhou, there are many families who do not raise silkworms themselves, but reel silk for others." The cocoons obtained by the cocoon merchants were outsourced to them for silk reeling. Two settlement processing fees.

As long as conditions permit, sericulture farmers try their best to reel their own silk and sell raw silk.This is more profitable.The silk reeling work is handled by the women of silkworm farmers—an important sideline in the countryside. The Shen family is Wang Siniang and her daughter who make pots and reel silk by hand.

The daughter-in-law of the Shen family explained roughly how to make a pot for silk reeling. When reeling silk, she used a large pot, boiled water, poured ten to twenty cocoons at a time, and stirred the cocoons with a bamboo stick.When it boils, use a bamboo stick to dial the water surface, and the silk head will naturally float out. Lift the silk head with your hand, penetrate it into the eye of the bamboo needle, rotate the pulley for the guide wire, and then hook it up with the moving wire rod, and send it to the The "Daguan car" used for winding silk is rotated by pedals, and the silk car can be pulled out continuously while operating and pedaling the silk car.

Silk reeling is hard work.As soon as the silkworms cocoon, they will race against time.If the silk is not reeled quickly, the chrysalis will emerge and bite its head.In this way, the cocoons are useless, so the whole family does the silk reeling, and the men also help to lay the hands, rushing to work day and night.A skilled labor force can reel about 30 taels of silk a day.If it is particularly thin "baotou silk", the daily output is only 20 taels.

Zhao Yingong has never read books on sericulture, but he knows that this kind of handmade product is low in efficiency and poor in quality. It was a complete failure in the market.

"Where is the best local silk source?" Zhao Yingong asked.

"Returning to my lord, it is better to have silk from Renhe County locally." Wang Siniang said cautiously, "If it is from Zhejiang, the best silk is Huzhou. Qili silk from Nanxun, Huzhou Prefecture is famous for its good silk. Gui'an, The counties of Deqing, Chongde, and Tongxiang all produce fine silk, and then the raw silk of Renhe is produced locally.”

"Renhe County produces mostly 'fat silk', while Huzhou produces 'fine silk'," Wang Siniang explained. "Fine silk" must be used for warp silk in order to weave patterned silks and satins.Because the jacquard machine for weaving silk and satin has certain requirements on the strength of the warp yarn, and the raw silk produced in the two places is tough and not easy to break.Other raw silk jacquard machines are basically useless.

"The local weaving government and weaving and dyeing bureau in Hangzhou also purchase raw silk from Huzhou and Jiaxing for weaving silk and satin for internal use. On the contrary, the raw silk in Renhe and Qiantang is not used much."

Zhao Yingong listened carefully.Apparently, the sericulture industry, like the sugar industry in Leizhou, is currently in a state of small-scale production.Manual production and small usury are indeed common forms in industry and commerce in this time and space.There are too many places where you can intervene and make profits.There were seven or eight thoughts swirling in his mind at the same time, and it seemed that each link could be intervened... He shook his head, allowed himself to be quiet, and sorted out a clue before returning to the interrupted topic.

"Where do you sell the silk you reel out?"

"There is a special silk store. As soon as the raw silk comes out, the 'silk customers' who buy raw silk come to the town." Wang Siniang said that the market for raw silk follows the market, but the price of ordinary raw silk is more than 40 taels per load all year round. .Since the Wanli Year, a large amount of raw silk and silk fabrics have been exported, and the market for raw silk has continued to rise. Although some years have been sluggish, the silk industry is still a profitable industry in most years.

"Oh," Zhao Yingong nodded, "You're talking about the silk industry, and you also need to get a toothpaste, and there is a company of the same trade?"

"I heard it's the same. However, slaves usually only meet 'silk guests' who come to the countryside, so I don't know much about the specific situation inside."

Wang Siniang said: "Silk customers" in some silk shops also lend money. Silkworm farmers can borrow from them, and repay the debt with raw silk after the new silk comes out.It seems that the procedures are simple, but in fact, when the debt is repaid, the valuation of raw silk is very low, and the silkworm farmers suffer a lot.

In exploiting silkworm farmers, "silk guests" are no more benevolent or trustworthy than Yuxing.However, once silkworm cocoons are reeled into new silk, there is also a time limit. Raw silk tends to turn yellow if left for a long time. If the silk customer deliberately delays the time, it can certainly lower the price of the silkworm farmer, but the time left for him to sell the raw silk after receiving it is also short.So things like deliberately delaying bargaining are rare.Silkworm farmers can get some benefits.

"Where does the raw silk from the silk shop end up being sold?"

"Most of them are sold to various weaving workshops, and some are also sold to foreign customers."

"Are there many local weaving silks and satins?"

"Reporting to my lord, why not many?" Wang Siniang said with a smile, "Not to mention, just the east mansion and the west mansion in this city, plus the two weaving and dyeing bureaus, the extra robe materials are thousands of pieces every year. That's not enough. Not counting other items. Together, the annual tribute silk materials will be tens of thousands.”

The name “East and West Two Mansions” caught his attention. Seeing his doubts, Cai Shi hurriedly explained: “It is the Weaving Mansion established by the imperial court in Hangzhou. It is just east of Puji Bridge. The silk and satin weaved there are for internal use. .” The two dyeing and weaving bureaus are also large government-run workshops with a large scale.

Zhao Yingong asked: "Can you weave silk?"

"Slaves don't know how to weave silk and satin. They are not only fathers and sons but also masters and apprentices. Those who are not slaves can get it."

"You go down first. You will be useful in a few days." Zhao Yingong said to Sun Wangcai, "These children will be enrolled in private school together."

　For the manual machine for reeling silk, you can refer to "Tiangong Kaiwu".

　　The so-called baotou silk is specially used for weaving headscarves, which is very thin.

　　
　
(End of this chapter)