He thought Lu Ling would be the same as before!
Lu Ling walked to a large vat, leaned slightly to look at the oil being stirred by workers in the vat, and replied calmly: "Uncle Du, the current state of the Lu family's industry cannot tolerate my squeamishness."
Butler Du chuckled and glanced at Song Wenzhou, who was standing next to Lu Ling.
Song Wenzhou looked away, pretending he didn't know Butler Du was looking at him.
Lu Ling kept staring at the oil mixture in the tank. When the young man who was stirring in front of the tank saw this, he felt like he was being beaten to death. The muscles in his arms bulged and he stirred even harder.
Song Wenzhou coughed and asked, "Ling'er, what is this?"
Lu Ling tilted his head and looked surprised: "Husband, these are tung oil and lard, which are necessary raw materials for refining soot. You don't know?"
When the young man who was stirring heard that the man next to Lu Ling turned out to be her husband, the chicken blood that had been injected seemed to be drawn out again, and half of the strength in his arm immediately disappeared.
Song Wenzhou laughed and said, "I have never seen the ink-making process, so naturally I don't know about it."
Lu Ling straightened up, smiled faintly, and said, "My husband is deaf to what is going on outside the window and only reads the books of sages. It's not surprising that he doesn't know."
Song Wenzhou felt bad no matter what he heard.
I didn't make any mistakes in my studies, but I also had an older brother who joined the army. My father wrote to me saying that he had obtained an official position in the army. At this time, compared with his elder brother, I had accomplished nothing.
He felt that Lu Ling was sarcastically saying that he was incapable of doing anything.
Thinking of this, his face became a little ugly.
Lu Ling looked at Butler Du and asked, "Uncle Du, I see there is no oversized paint in this tank?"
Lacquer is lacquer oil, which is cut from the lacquer tree. After mixing with tung oil and lard, it burns to form soot, which is then used to make ink.
Butler Du's face tightened and he had a bad feeling.
The eldest lady has never been to the workshop, how did she know that there was no overpaint in it?
Just as Butler Du was about to speak, the young man explained: "Miss, this tung oil has been mixed with lacquer before it was purchased."
"Really?" Lu Ling glanced at Housekeeper Du, thinking that she was a housewife who never left the house and didn't know anything.
Butler Du quickly smiled and said: "Miss, the tung oil, lacquer oil and lard were purchased by the old slave, so there should be no problem."
"What should it mean? Uncle Du, you have been with my father for more than 20 years. You know better than me. It is most taboo to use words like "about" and "should" in business, right? "
"..." Butler Du looked a little embarrassed, and quickly lowered his head and said, "What the young lady taught you is that this old slave is confused."
Lu Ling smiled faintly and said nothing.
The ink produced by the Lu family is called "Wu Yujue". The raw materials selected are fine and expensive, and the finished ink strips are very popular among scholars in Yucheng.
The first step in making ink sticks is to collect soot, and the main raw materials used for burning are tung oil, lard and lacquer oil.
After the three raw materials are stirred and mixed, they can be burned to produce soot.
The addition of lard can increase the amount of smoke produced, and the addition of paint oil can increase the blackness of the smoke.
Because the lacquer yield rate of lacquer is very low and the conditions for extracting lacquer are difficult, the price of lacquer oil is several times that of lard and tung oil.
Because lacquer is expensive, most ink-making workshops will omit lacquer, but the Lu family does not.
The Lu family added lacquer, and the quality of the ink sticks they produced surpassed other workshops.
In the past two years after Mr. Lu left, he did not inspect the workshop regularly, so there was no guarantee that someone would not secretly omit this raw material. However, the Lu family's expenditure on purchasing paint was still recorded in the accounts.
The money was spent, but if Lu Ling had not come to the workshop, he would not have discovered that the paint was missing from the raw materials.
She secretly gritted her teeth and suppressed her bad emotions.
"Miss, let's go inside and have a look." Butler Du quickly made a gesture inviting Lu Ling to come in.
Lu Ling nodded and followed Butler Du.
When I came to the lobby, I saw bowls of mixed crude oil on the ground. There was a wick in each bowl, and they were all burning. This was the process of burning to get soot.
One pound of oil can only produce one tael of soot.
Lu Ling walked in front of rows of burning lamps. He knelt down and smeared some cigarette ash with his fingers, put it in front of his nose, sniffed, and looked carefully.
Butler Du swallowed his saliva on the side.
"Uncle Du, come and take a look." Lu Ling said softly.
Butler Du hurriedly walked to Lu Ling's side.
Lu Ling looked at the soot on his fingers and said, "Uncle Du, the blackness is not enough. Such blackness can only mean that there is no lacquer oil added to the crude oil."
Song Wenzhou stared at Lu Ling's fingers, then glanced at Butler Du quietly, and then said: "Ling'er, how do you know the soot is not dark enough?"
Lu Ling turned to glance at him and said, "Since my husband doesn't understand, why are you talking so much?"
Song Wenzhou: "..."
Lu Ling wiped the ash from his fingers and explained: "When my father was alive, he told me in detail the process of making ink sticks, and even compared other people's ink with my Lu family's ink. Besides, I have always used He is also Mo from my Lu family, how could you not see that?"
"Um..." Butler Du licked his lips, and some cold sweat quietly escaped from his hands under his sleeves, "Miss, when I bought the tung oil, it was indeed added with lacquer oil, but I think the seller secretly reduced it while we were not paying attention. quantity……"
Lu Ling closed her eyes with a sleepy look. When she opened them again, she said in a deep voice, "Uncle Du, please gather all the workers responsible for purchasing raw materials outside the tea room."
"Old slave, go now, go now!" Butler Du wiped the sweat from his head and hurried away.
Song Wenzhou quietly glanced at Butler Du's figure running out in a hurry, and secretly tightened his hands in his sleeves.
Later, Lu Ling went to see the smoke washing pool.
The soot obtained after combustion needs to be cleaned to remove impurities.
There was no room for manipulation in this process, so she asked the workers to just be careful about cleaning.
Come to the tobacco drying warehouse again.
Cleaned soot needs to be stored in a smoke drying warehouse for a year or more to remove moisture and fire.
Then we went to the glue boiling room.
This is another tricky step.
Glue boiling is a soup made by boiling beef glue, adding gold powder, cinnabar, borneol, musk and other medicinal materials. After mixing the two, stir it with the soot. At this time, most of the ink has been completed.
However, whether it is beef glue or Chinese medicinal materials, they are very expensive. When purchasing these materials, I am afraid that someone will pass them off as good ones, resulting in the final quality of the finished ink. As for who dares to be so bold, we will know.
After spending half an hour, Lu Ling went through all the processes, then walked out of the workshop and went to the tea room next to it.
Butler Du has gathered all the people in charge of purchasing together, and they are all standing at the door of the tea room waiting.
