Daily life of farming and supporting a family on the ancient Loess Plateau

Jia Ronghua looked at the finished medicine pouch and said, "Mother, why don't we use the corners we just cut off to sew a tobacco pouch for Father? That way, it will be much easier to hang it on the pipe and take out the tobacco leaves."

Ji Yongling looked at the scraps that had just been cut off. The largest piece was no bigger than a mineral water bottle cap. To sew a palm-sized tobacco bag from these scraps, not to mention the difficulty, the level of frugality was truly admirable.

No wonder Yang called these scraps of cloth "broken pieces"—they were indeed quite "broken."

Even after reaching this stage, the medicine pouch is not yet finished. Finally, a thin rope that can be hung on the body must be sewn above the opening of the pouch.

In this era, the ropes used to tie clothes were made by women in the family by twisting together strands of fine thread. There were cotton threads, silk threads, or hemp threads used for sewing shoe soles. Of course, silk threads were generally unaffordable for ordinary families.

For aesthetic purposes, Ji Yongling chose cotton thread, but the cotton thread in the Ji family was all white thread spun by themselves and had not been dyed. So Ji Yongling had to take some dye from the logistics warehouse of the storage facility to dye the cotton thread first.

Fortunately, industrial dyes are easy to use, and I didn't have much cotton thread at home, so the dyeing and drying were completed in half a day.

Several women gathered around Jia Ronghua's kang (heated brick bed), working in an assembly line according to Ji Yongling's instructions. Before long, seven or eight simple and plain medicine pouches were finished.

The more Yang looked at the medicine pouch, the more she thought it could be made into a money bag and sold at the market, but Ji Yongling refused.

She said, "Grandma, these scraps of cloth were brought by Manager Wang. Although he didn't say we should make them all into samples, it wouldn't be good to use them to make other things to sell. Let's go to the county tomorrow and ask Manager Wang. If he doesn't want the remaining scraps, we can make something else."

In fact, Madam Yang knew in her heart that these scraps of cloth would cost money to buy. She just felt that the shopkeeper of such a large shop would definitely not use up the whole bolt of cloth and would not want these leftover "rags".

Seeing that Ji Yongling was rubbing the dyed cotton thread vigorously with her hands, and that the color didn't come off even when she dipped it in water, Hu Xirong asked, "Ling'er, where did you get this dye? The color is so bright and clean, and it doesn't fade. Tsk tsk, it's really beautiful. If you have any more, pour some for your fourth aunt, and I'll dye some red ribbons for you and Ru'er to tie in your hair."

Jia Ronghua guessed that the dye might have been taken by her daughter from the "Heavenly Granary," and said, "There must not be much of such a good thing."

Ji Yongling thought for a moment. Since the dye in the logistics warehouse was all destined for overseas and there was still a lot of stock, she said, "There's still some left. I'll pour some for you later, but I don't want the red hair tie." She also wanted to say that she planned to cut her hair, but she held back.

The next day, as soon as the gate to Old Ji's courtyard was opened, villagers were already waiting outside, some pulling carts and others carrying bundles of medicinal herbs.

Ji Manchuan and Ji Manqing didn't have time to drive the mule cart to the next village. They first opened the courtyard gate completely to receive the villagers who came to sell medicinal herbs.

Before long, Ji Mantun arrived with Ji Yongbai and Ji Yonghua.

In light of the previous incident involving the collection of mugwort leaves, this time Old Master Ji specifically arranged for Ji Yongning to visit Ji Mantun's family to discuss the medicinal herb collection. He also instructed Zhao Yunxia to inform her family to send over any available herbs as soon as possible. As for his other two wives' families, he planned to have Ji Manchuan and Ji Manqing make a special trip there.

When Ji Mantun got home in the evening, he heard that the old courtyard had started collecting medicinal herbs again, and the quantity was quite large. He thought that they must be short-handed, so he didn't plan to go and carry wood again. Therefore, he brought Ji Yongbai and Ji Yonghua to help early in the morning.

At this moment, the old courtyard of the Ji family was already bustling with activity.

Grandpa Ji and Ji Manchuan were checking the color and dryness of the medicinal herbs; Hu Xirong and Yang were tidying up the empty cave dwelling to store the herbs; Ji Yongning and Ji Yongzhou were helping to find ropes and get flat baskets.

Ji Manqing was the only one responsible for moving and weighing the items; his eyes were practically popping out of their sockets from exhaustion.

Before long, the courtyard was filled with various medicinal herbs, including mugwort, angelica, pinellia, and codonopsis.

When Ji Yongling saw her second uncle and the others come to help, she didn't even have time to greet them before directly instructing Ji Mantun to help Ji Manqing weigh the items. Ji Yongbai and Ji Yonghua were then called to her side to help.

Seeing that Ji Yongling was holding a stack of yellow paper for grave sweeping in his left hand and a thick chicken feather in his right hand, occasionally dipping it into a broken bowl on a low stool, Ji Yongbai asked curiously, "Yongling, what kind of talisman are you drawing?"

As Ji Yongling scribbled on the yellow paper, he replied, "Second Brother, I'm keeping accounts. You and Third Brother should both learn. I have to go to the county at noon, so you can continue keeping accounts for me then." He then handed a page that was already full of entries to Ji Yongbai to look through.

Because there were no extra paper and pens at home, Ji Yongling asked his grandfather for some yellow paper to use, which made his grandfather's teeth ache with worry.

Ji Yongbai and Ji Yonghua couldn't understand the grid on the yellow paper, so they asked, "Ling'er, what's the purpose of these grids?"

Ji Yongling pointed to the grid with a chicken feather and said, "This is a table. The top row is the header. Just fill in the date, type, weight, amount, delivery person and consignee in the corresponding vertical rows according to the contents of the header."

Ji Yongbai looked at it carefully and nodded: "This way of recording is indeed much simpler and clearer. Who came up with this idea? Why didn't I think of recording it this way?"

Ji Yongling smiled but didn't say anything.

Ji Yongbo continued looking at the form on the yellow paper, occasionally exchanging a few words with Ji Yonghua. He then dipped a chicken feather in paint and made a few strokes on the back of his hand, finding the feather quite useful for writing—it was fast and didn't smudge. He wanted to ask what kind of paint it was, but he was so engrossed in looking at the form that he forgot.

He looked at the records on the form several times, deeply admiring the ingenuity of the record-keeping. Although some characters had missing strokes and the handwriting wasn't very beautiful or elegant, the content was still clear and easy to understand.

When he was carrying timber with his father, he had seen the accountants of the wealthy Zhao family keeping books. The books were full of characters, slow to memorize, and easy to make mistakes, and most people couldn't understand them. But now, the way they kept the books was very simple, and even a greenhorn like him, who wasn't very literate and didn't know how to keep accounts, could understand them.

Seeing that Ji Yongbai had already understood, Ji Yongling had Ji Yongbai try to write down a bill when Ji Manqing brought over the weighed medicinal herbs. Seeing that there were no mistakes, she handed the bookkeeping over to Ji Yongbai, while she was in charge of calculating the bills and making payments.

People delivering medicinal herbs came and went in the courtyard. Several old men from the village who had already sold their herbs were reluctant to leave, squatting by the side watching Grandpa Ji inspect the herbs. As Grandpa Ji went through the herbs brought by the villagers, he chatted with the old men in between, his smile never fading.

Yang was constantly on the move, sometimes shouting that the medicinal herbs shouldn't be left lying around, sometimes asking so-and-so to help with something. She seemed to be spinning around the yard like a top, but no one knew what she was actually busy with.