Chapter 40: New Year (1)

After Labayi, more than ten days will be the day to worship the Kitchen God. Everyone in the mansion is busy with the years. The most important thing is to clean the house, that is, to sweep the house. The servants, servants, mothers, and maids in the mansion are mobilized, and even the family members who visit relatives are given a broom to sweep the yard.

There are many courtyards in the mansion, with more halls and pavilions. Apart from the free yards in the inner courtyard, there are only more than a hundred and ten rooms. Not to mention the daily work of cleaning windows and walls, just the dark buildings, partitions, railings, and various carved screens in the interior are enough to clean up. Some of them are carved with landscapes. People, fish, insects, birds and beasts, such as fine carvings, will be damaged if you are not careful. In addition, there are various decorations in the house, such as fine porcelain, jade, antiques, calligraphy and paintings, bottles, tripods and Yi Zuns, etc., all of them are treasures, so be careful. Some are washed by water and some are oil-wiped, which is very cumbersome.

If there were no large number of people, it would be impossible to achieve a good morning and night. Fortunately, Zheng Shou, who was in charge of the mansion's miscellaneous affairs, and Jianxi, who managed the inner court, had participated in this kind of battle, and was considered experienced. They divided all the people into groups, led by experienced people, divided the work and cooperated, and each was a common model of "production contract responsibility system" in later generations. The two of them coordinated and commanded, allocated personnel, and looked like a general who was commanding thousands of troops.

Zhao Qi looked at how he seemed to be in trouble wherever he stayed, so he simply hid in the craftsman's craftsman's house with two small yellow gates. There were more than a dozen people here, not only those who were masons, carpenters, blacksmiths, but also copper smiths, silver smiths, and those who did fine work were usually responsible for repairing and repairing the mansion, and also for making the required supplies. They were considered as maintenance teams in the mansion. But although they had few staff, they were all old craftsmen who had been in the industry for many years and had rich experience, otherwise they would not have been selected into the royal palace.

As soon as Zhao Qi entered their courtyard, he felt friendly to see the tools of blacksmith furnaces, vises, hammers, and saws placed beside him. He learned how to make machinery in his previous life, but in the future he either went to the design institute or to produce aircraft cannons, machine guns and missiles, but by chance he was selected into the special forces, which changed his fate in his previous life.

"Hello, Erye, why did you come to this place? There is no place to sit!" Zhang Erbao, the foreman of the craftsman, was surprised to see Zhao Qi coming in and said helplessly.

"Master Zhang, they think I'm in the way wherever I go. I think I'm hiding here. It seems that you don't welcome me!" Zhao Qi pretended to have a bitter face and said.

"The second master is the young ones, so we can't invite you!" Zhang Erbao quickly let Zhao Qi and the others into the house, and the others hurriedly met. Zhang Erbao wiped the only chair in the house with his sleeves several times, and then put on the cotton mat sewn by his wife before asking him to sit down. The others quickly put the brazier on and were busy pouring tea for him.

"Dear masters, please sit down, don't be restrained, I'll just hide here. If you are polite, it will be my fault!" Zhao Qi made a rogue bow and showed his two little tiger teeth and said indifferently.

"Haha, Er Master is joking. We are so simple here, I'm afraid we'll treat you slowly!" The copper smith Zhang Liujin brought out a handful of walnuts, dates, persimmon cakes, chestnuts and other dried fruits with him and said, "Don't look at others' rudeness, they are good at using a six-jin hammer to make copperware. People call him Zhang Liujin, but ignore his real name, "Second Master, just eat some, these are brought by the wives who come to the mansion to celebrate the New Year. Although it is common, it is produced at home, so eat fresh!"

"Okay, everyone in the family is here, are you still adapting to it?" Zhao Qiong picked up a date and put it in his mouth and took it and said.

"I have to thank you for your kindness. These old ladies rarely even go out. If the mansion hadn't sent someone to pick you up, I'd probably be lost as soon as I went out. There were food and drinks in the mansion. What could they do if they were there? I wanted to find something to do for a few days, but I didn't want to go back!" said carpenter Lu Dabin.

"This is a good thing. We have developed in the future. What we lack is manpower. After the New Year, we cannot lack people to boil water and cook on the construction site. After the dam is repaired, we can raise ducks and fish. We will also build wineries in the future. There are people in the mills. We are worried about not having work to do. If we are willing to stay, the mansion can help solve the place where we live, and save you lovesickness and can't sleep at night!" Zhao Qi said.

"Then we thanked the second master. Many wives do laundry and cook like homes. I don't know how happy I heard about it!" Zhang Liujin said with tears in his eyes. The other people were also grateful. Who wouldn't want his wife and children to live together on the warm bed? But in the past, these were all luxury hopes. Craftsmen were all independent. Not only could they not leave their household registration at will, but they also had to wait for the recommendations at any time. Working in workshops, they often had homes that could not go back, and couples were separated.

Zhao Qiong talked to everyone for a while, and the topic turned to craftsmanship. He didn't know much about the production technology in ancient times and wanted to learn about the level of modern scientific and technological development from the conversation with them. These craftsmen are living textbooks, and it is them who have created many new crafts in practice.

"Master Zhang, look at this copper piece. If I want to make him like this, what will you do?" Zhao Qiong picked up a thin copper skin on the case and gestured.

"Second Master, this is easy to deal with. You can knock it out directly with a hammer, and there will be no wrinkles!" Zhang Liujin took the copper plate and said immediately.

"If I need a large number of the same size, is there any way to hurry up?" Zhao Qi asked again.

"This is not impossible. Just make a yin and yang mold. Put the copper piece on it and hit it with a hammer to ensure that everyone is the same size!" Zhang Liujin quickly came up with a way, and did not have idle hands. He did what Zhao Qi wanted while talking.

"Master Cao, can you do it if I had to drill a hole in the two-foot-long fine iron rod?" Zhao Qi asked Cao Shuangcheng who was watching. He was a blacksmith.

"Second Master, that one is too long, we can't do it. One is not a good drill, and the other cannot be guaranteed not to deviate. A shorter one can be done!" Cao Shuangcheng replied respectfully.

"Oh!" Zhao Qi nodded. His question was not aimless. He wanted to improve his gun because his revolver fired medicine uses black gunpowder and contains nitro. This thing is easily damp when placed for a long time. If you don't pay attention, you may be silenced when firing. If you want to solve this problem, you can only make bullets that combine the fired medicine and the warhead.

In many people's understanding, there is improvement in the gun before the development of bullets. In fact, this is wrong. The development of guns develops step by step with the improvement of bullet manufacturing technology. From the conversation and demonstration just now, Zhao Qiong understood that it is a luxury to use existing craftsmanship to make bullet shells in the modern sense, but it is completely possible to make a fire hat with a base fire. He had a sudden idea. If using early paper shells might work, it could solve the serious wear caused by air leakage during firing and frequent firing of bullet chambers. If the barrel of the gun can be changed to fine iron, it can basically create a revolver that can be used for practical combat.

"Second Master, do you want to make something? We will try every means to make it for you!" Cao Shuangcheng asked carefully as he looked at Zhao Qi in a daze.

"Well, this is not urgent. Now I have an urgent job and I want everyone to find a way to help me find a way!" Zhao Qi said.

"Second Master, you said!" Several craftsmen stretched their heads and said, "Only Zhang Liujin has made a big hot pot for the prince these days, and he has also received a lot of rewards. Everyone else thought that their skills are not bad, and they are trying to show off their skills.

"Have you ever seen the 'mercury extractor' used by Taoist priests?" Zhao Qi asked. The soju he made two days ago was made using the mercury extractor left by Qingyun in the Taoist temple. In order to extract mercury from the cinnabar, those ancient Taoists designed a distiller, which was divided into two parts, with the upper part shaped like a round bottom flask, called a "pomegranate jar". It is an airtight container for cinnabar and other medicines. A tube is passed along the side and the lower part is barrel-shaped, called "Ganguozi". When used, heat it so that the mercury vapor generated in the container can flow into the condensing tank placed next to it, so that the mercury vapor generated in the tank becomes liquid mercury in the cold water of Ganhaozi.

Such distillation equipment seems quite complete even today. However, it is okay to make wine and make small fuss, but it is definitely not good to make soybean wine on a large scale, so it must be improved on this basis. These things may be used after the New Year. I will discuss them with these experts now.

It is said that there is no first in literature and no second in martial arts. Craftsmen also like to distinguish higher. These people formed a "scientific research team" around the propositions proposed by the prince and began to discuss. The carpenters thought about how to solve them with their own methods. The blacksmiths and copper smiths also proposed plans from their own perspectives. The only depression is the silversmiths and jade craftsmen. They can't inlaid gold and silver on this thing and carve flowers.

Everyone came up with their own ideas and found a way. Zhao Xiao listened to this and said a few words to that, which mobilized everyone's enthusiasm. Zhao Xiao spent almost a day here and ate lunch here. Finally, he came up with a preliminary opinion and agreed to start trial production after the New Year.

When the sun was about to set, he found the place anxiously, "Second Master, why are you hiding here? Everyone is waiting for you to preside over the sacrifice of the kitchen. Come back with me to change clothes!" He saw the prince and a group of craftsmen talking enthusiastically, and said with a sad face.

"Second Master, go back quickly. This is a big deal and cannot be delayed!" After everyone's persuasion, Zhao Qi reluctantly left the jiangfang and followed Jianxi back.
Chapter completed!