"Both soft and hard, both grace and power!"

The word does seem to be a good word, but Shu Hui can't say why it's a good method. Maybe the good words in his eyes are messy in the eyes of everyone in calligraphy?

But it doesn't matter, just feel good about yourself.

Although he got this fan, Shu Hui didn't plan to use it to pretend. The reason for this is that this fan is not the kind of folding fan that can be unfolded with a "bang", but a fan with a handle in a wooden frame.

After seeing a lot of advertising fans issued by the hospital, Shu Hui was really resistant to this shape.

At this time, folding folding fans were quite popular, and they could be traced back to the Jin Dynasty at the earliest, but its principle was completely different. To put it simply, a fan can be folded up like an umbrella to become a bunch of fans, and the fan bones are completely symmetrical, so the fan surface can only be made of flexible fine silk.

As for the folding fan, it was generally believed to be an invention of the Japanese, and in the late Tang Dynasty, it began to pay tribute to the Tang Dynasty, and the real cultural trend was due to the preference of the Yongle Emperor of the Ming Dynasty for it.

Shu Hui didn't care whose invention it was, he only knew that at this moment, there was no such elegant plaything......

Wouldn't it become its own invention?

This inscription fan, after I went back, I sent someone to Dongjie to find someone to install it, and then hung it on the wall.

Since Shu Hui already had an idea, he didn't stay long. Let Hongyu take the newly obtained fan and say goodbye to Brother Zhang's father and son, and go home to study the hard pen.

Minerals and charcoal, the earliest pencil should have been bamboo skewers used by carpenters to mark sizes. However, due to the lack of an overall understanding of the capillary effect by the ancients, they did not find a truly effective way to use it.

Compared with using dried bamboo yellow dipped in ink as a pen, in fact, fresh bamboo can be sharpened and dried in the shade, which can obtain better ink absorption performance. But since Shu Hui is from the next generation, of course, it is impossible to go through all those detours step by step, so Shu Hui first thought of making quills.

The invention of the quill can be traced back to Europe around 700 AD. In other words, at this moment, there is no quill in the world that can be recorded in the history books.

Although it has a soft feel, the principle of the quill is exactly the same as that of the dipped fountain pen of later generations. The water storage fountain pen is more complicated, with today's technology may be difficult to achieve, although the quill pen needs to be dipped in ink from time to time, but who calls the brush also need it?

Regarding the introduction of the concept of hard pen writing, Shu Hui has also been carefully considered.

Aside from the cost advantages mentioned earlier, there is actually a big advantage of hard pen writing in that it is easier to get started. Compared with the use of a brush to write, which requires an accurate grasp of wrist strength, a hard pen does not need to go through too much practice to write slightly readable words, and young children with low hand strength can also be used for enlightenment.

Mastering one more hard pen writing method will not cost the scholars too much extra time.

In Shu Hui's plan, he actually wanted to take out the glass dip pen directly. The craftsmanship of this pen is not complicated, and it is better than the quill pen, but now there is no glass, so it has to be replaced by a quill pen.

Once he's found a suitable replacement material, or if he's successfully fired the glass one day, it's not too late to upgrade the pen.

Shu Hui returned to his mansion and first went to rummage through the two tall museum shelves on the west side of the main house. He was under the impression that there were quite a few birds of prey or beautiful bird feathers.

A small number of them were bought by himself in the market, and most of them were given by others who voted for him. Ever since he learned that there were people who hunted birds with beautiful feathers specifically for this purpose, Shu Hui had never accepted such a gift again.

"If there is no buying, there is no killing, what a sin." When Ao Guang took down a lacquer jar containing about thirty colorful feathers from the penultimate layer of the shelf, Shu Hui couldn't help but secretly confess his guilt.

Throughout the ages, how many exotic animals have been extinct because of their beautiful fur or horns? In Shu Hui's view, all hunting that happens only for the sake of preference is not just.

"But as soon as I bring up this quill pen, there must be a lot of boring literati who will make some name for themselves. Either they will say that the feathers of some innocent bird are particularly compelling, or they will say that the feathers plucked from live birds are more spiritual......"

"I'm sorry, beasts."

This kind of thing is sure to happen! But what needs to be done still has to be done. The natural world is like this, Shu Hui has no resistance to this, all he is worried about is some senseless killing.

"Under normal circumstances, chickens, ducks and geese slaughtered as poultry can fully meet the consumption of quills, after all, a pen can be used for a long time. But try to avoid the boring people you considered earlier. ”

Shu Hui touched his chin, prohibiting the plucking of live poultry feathers is actually very easy to implement, and now he can be regarded as a god who saves the suffering, and no one will disobey himself for this requirement.

As for the most inferior "inventors" who like to be unconventional and play with their brains, it is necessary for them to set the highest standards in advance before the quill spreads.

Shu Hui picked and chose between the pile of feathers, and suddenly his heart moved, and he pulled out a feather about thirty centimeters long, black and white, with a small number of brown spots.

This is the third feather on the left wing of an adult sparrowhawk, and generally the longest feather on its left wing. Its appearance is generous and beautiful, the feather branch is neat, the feather shaft is strong, the feather stalk is dense, and it has not emitted a peculiar smell after nearly two years of degreasing - of course, it may also be that the peculiar smell has long been volatilized.

Its size is particularly suitable for writing. Coupled with the identity of the original owner of the bird of prey, it is more noble than the wolf in the brush, which can well meet the psychology of a small number of people who are eager to be superior everywhere.

What's more critical is that although sparrowhawks are not easy to catch, they are not rare. Although it is not as large as an eagle and can attack poultry and young animals and even children, it is a greater threat to young poultry than an eagle.

Coupled with the fact that it is far larger than the number of eagles in the plains and hills, it can be described as a thorn in the side of farmers. Shu Hui pointed the finger at this bird of prey, which can be described as killing two birds with one stone, why not?

This sparrowhawk is commonly known as the harrier, but it is not the same thing as the harrier, and its size is still a little smaller than the harrier. For the literati, Shu Hui's push for the sparrowhawk's feathers as a fine treasure in quills was more acceptable than other birds.

Because the feathers of this sparrowhawk have a very nice name, the left and right feathers are called the wind and the grass respectively. Most people's dominant hand is the right hand, and the bending direction of the left wing feather is just right to grasp, so this noble quill has a very compelling name——

Flirtatious pen!

Although he felt that it was a bit strange to name the wings on the left and right sides of a bird, it might be just an intertextual borrowing in Shu Hui's opinion, but the literati at this time would not think so. Naming the sexes of an animal is a great pleasure in their eyes.

Plan and then act, this is Shu Hui's consistent proposition. Now that you've thought about it so long-term, all the next thing to think about is just to enrich the details of the plan, and don't bother too much.

"Red fish, go to the outer courtyard and ask someone to collect some goose feathers, as well as chicken and duck feathers. It's good to buy it, or to tear down the shuttlecocks kicked by the bear children on the street...... It's really not possible to slaughter two, get them as soon as possible. ”

Shu Hui touched his chin, a face that could dissect everything for the sake of science.

"Then let the kitchen boil hot water and steam these feathers for half an hour, and then bring them after you can't smell anything."

After instructing the red fish, Shu Hui waited with his chin in dry. In boredom, I felt as if something was missing from my mouth, and suddenly remembered something:

"Ao Guang, turn on the oven and take a look, is the chiffon cake baked before going out still hot?"

Ao Guang went to the small kitchen in the back room, which had been converted from a vacant room, and put a wet linen cloth on the handle of the metal door of the oven that did not have any visible window and judged the heat by feeling, and then pulled out the whole door.

The structure of the oven is very simple, it is a concave box that can be filled with charcoal in a sandwich iron mesh, plus two doors that can also be used for charcoal and a lid with a sandwich. There are also two piercing holes in the middle of the frame, which are convenient for inserting the bracket when making roast duck.

But after a while, he came back with a plate of six chiffon cakes: "Young master, the charcoal fire in the oven has not been completely extinguished, and it is still hot at the moment." ”

The red fish also came back at about the same time, and Shu Hui and the three of them ate snacks with a pot of tea boiled by Shu Hui with the air conditioner.

Tang people are not good at drinking tea, and the tea soup that Shu Hui saw in Yuan Tiangang before, although it has a long history, is a rare thing at this time.

This is because the Tang people like to drink alcohol, whether it is a variety of grain wine and fruit wine, it is very popular. Even women or monks who do not drink alcohol drink sale pulp, grape pulp, and pastry cheese contain alcohol.

Shu Hui doesn't like to drink tea very much, but he doesn't have any hobby for wine, and he never takes the initiative to drink. When it comes to Tang drinks, he is even more fond of an almond oatmeal porridge called liquor.

However, this kind of food that can barely be regarded as a drink is a characteristic of the Cold Food Festival, that is, two days after Qingming, under normal circumstances, all cold drinks are eaten. However, for Shu Hui, how can oatmeal porridge with maltose not be heated?

Cold cereal, how can he drink it!

The three of them talked nonsense one after another, and time passed quickly. When it was close to noon, a slave and maid handed over more than 20 feathers of various kinds that had been skimmed.

Shu Hui looked through it and found that all eight of the goose feathers were from the same unlucky goose, which was probably slaughtered. In addition, the chickens and ducks are not bad, and it seems that there are quite a lot of resources, and they have been selected.

I picked one up and put it to my nose and smelled it, and found that there was still a faint smell, and it was estimated that it could not be completely removed. I twisted it by hand, and no oil leached out.

Degreasing is done to remove the grease that has been applied to the surface of the feathers in order to prevent the feathers from being wet and unable to fly. These oils will oxidize and stink over time, and will also breed germs.

"Well, the degreasing process is complete, and the next step is hardening." The cuticle of the feather stalk needs to be denatured and hardened by heat treatment to give it a pleasant feeling for writing, and its conductivity to ink can be enhanced.

These processes are very simple, but for the ancients who did not know the specific principles, they had to master these experiences, and they did not know how many detours they experienced.

"Go and bring a brazier, it's filled with soot...... Take a look at the oven in the backyard kitchenette, and the ash inside might be just right. ”

Shu Hui once saw this step in the manual tutorial is to use hot sand to process, but the temperature of hot sand is not as uniform and soft as carbon ash, for Shu Hui who tried it for the first time, it is undoubtedly a wiser choice to spend a little more time to achieve stable results.

When the brazier came, Shu Hui used a feather of a chicken feather into the ash and stirred it a few times, looked at it and saw that there seemed to be no change, and then hung it with his hand about ten centimeters above it to feel the temperature, and it was indeed not high enough.

Plans have changed, and waiting for the new charcoal to burn to ashes will undoubtedly be more time-consuming than preparing a pot of hot sand. Shu Hui weighed it again and decided to switch to sandy soil with a larger heat capacity.

No way, Shu Hui's plan is so flexible and changeable.

After another boring wait, when the tea in the pot was almost finished, a pot of clay that burned enough to ignite pieces of paper was carried by two slaves and maids to Shu Hui's door with a short ladder.

This soil is too hot, after all, this kind of thing is not easy to master, and without a thermometer, Shu Hui can't describe how high the temperature he needs.

He took a wooden stick and stirred it repeatedly, so that all layers of soil dissipated evenly and evenly. When he threw in another straw and found that it had not become charred, he took out the chicken feathers that he had used to stir up the soot.

He buried the feathers upside down in the sand, and when he turned them out, he found that although he could smell a burnt egg white, there were no traces of burnt yellow on the feathers, and it seemed that the temperature was suitable.

He put the dozens of feathers that he had prepared before, as well as the "flirting wind", into the clay pot full of hot mud and sand. Three-quarters of the feather stalk was sunk into the mud, and the whole basin resembled the crown hat of a chieftain of a primitive tribe.

Clapped his hands, and it was half done. Shu Hui found that there is an advantage of being a child, that is, there is no backache after lying on the stomach for a long time.

The next step is to wait for the petulette to harden, which takes about one to two hours of heat treatment to complete. However, this part does not require human intervention, and it is enough to wait for the sediment to cool naturally. Formally, it is a bit like the annealing process in the metal heat treatment process, but the principle is completely different, and the result is exactly the opposite.

When Shu Hui had lunch, he suddenly remembered: "Did I forget to release Fat Da?" ”

Cats and bears are omnivores and eat everything, but prefer raw food for flesh and blood - but Shu Hui never settles for it, either eating bamboo or only cooked meat.

It is not easy to find fresh bamboo for him to eat at any time in the county. The places where the autumn breeze can be played have been beaten by Shu Hui, but because of this, he has a lot of relationships with many people. Nowadays, Fatda's food is a mixture of vegetables and whole grains, and you can eat a piece of stewed lamb leg every once in a while, and there are too few bamboos in the genus Bamboo that can only be used as a snack.

Two hours later, Shu Hui pulled out all the feathers that had hardened and become cloudy, and then instructed Hongyu to mix up cigarette ink and prepare paper. Shu Hui doesn't need these things, but Ao Guang and Hongyu often exchange letters with the palace, so they have been prepared for a long time.

Shu Hui still took out the chicken feathers that had been torn off with ash at the top, and asked Ao Guang to hand over his iron dagger.

In terms of smelting and forging processes at this time, iron swords were the best weapons, all of which relied on imports. Although China's smelting industry also has a long history, due to the lack of high-grade mineral deposits, it has always lagged behind the West in the same period before mastering more advanced smelting technology.

The iron dagger in Ao Guang's hand was transferred from Tianzhu to Datang. Because Tianzhu is located in the Indo-Pakistani subcontinent, there is a natural moat between Tianzhu and the Tang Dynasty, and the iron products that enter the Tang Dynasty are particularly rare.

Using a dagger to cut the tip of the feather handle into a sharp bevel, Shu Hui found it very difficult for him, and he almost cut his hand after several unsuccessful times. By the time he had cut out a bevel at the right angle, half of the feather stalk had been removed.

Shu Hui did this and simply stopped doing it himself, and handed it to Ao Guang, his hand should be very stable.

"Drill a small hole in the middle of the two points of the tip, the smaller the better." This allows the ink to flow to the front of the quill.

"Then use a dagger to carve a dent between the small hole and the tip of the pen, it is best to carve it a little deeper, but not to cut it through." This step is to facilitate the flow of ink through the small hole to the nib. The reason why it can't be carved through is because the quill is still a little soft even after hardening, and the writing will split when carved through.

Ao Guang complied one by one, because of the limitations of the tools, he could neither drill the hole small enough nor cut the nick deep enough, but he seemed to be somewhat satisfied with his craftsmanship without seeing advanced tools.

Shu Hui took the first quill that Ao Guang had completed, and walked to the low table where the red fish was arranged. Dip it in the prepared ink, wait for the feather tube to absorb enough ink, and then drag and scrape twice on the edge of the inkstone to evenly distribute the ink and avoid falling ink.

Then he took the trouble to write on a piece of fine rice paper: "Qili Xiang ......"

Ao Guang and Hongyu looked at Shu Hui in surprise, this was the first time Shu Hui had written in front of them. Ao Guang didn't say it, Hongyu, who was almost inseparable from Shu Hui, could be sure that this was also Shu Hui's first time writing.

Can you still hold a pen like this? It seems to be a bit similar to holding chopsticks, but looking at the young master's posture doesn't look like a mess......

To Shu Hui's surprise, this first quill was made very smoothly. Except for a little lack of run-in and a slight scraping of paper, the writing feel is very beautiful, and it is more handy than the fountain pen he used in his previous life.

After all, a quill is much softer than a fountain pen, and it is more desirable between transfers.

By the time Shu Hui wrote "The pencil in his hand is in the ......", he was completely out of ink. Although it seems that the ink that can be absorbed by dipping the ink once is completely incomparable with an ordinary trumpet and milli pen, it can't stand the small words written by the quill pen!

If you change the brush, it is estimated that half of these words will be enough to choke, and the ink used is several times more than that of the quill.

Shu Hui originally asked Hongyu to change a few more kinds of paper, but Hongyu and Ao Guang only used the best Xuancheng paper, and it was only used for letters, and they did not prepare other varieties of paper at all.

After thinking about it, Shu Hui didn't ask people to buy a few temporarily. If a quill uses ordinary ink, it will not have any advantage over a brush in picking paper, but because its harder strokes have higher requirements for the hardness of the paper.

However, just reducing the width of the font and stroke can achieve the dual purpose of saving ink and paper at the same time. When new inks are made that are suitable for quills, it will be better to use paper that is strong enough but not gelatinous enough to get inked.

The preparation of new inks should also be completed as early as possible. Because the quill is still not suitable for writing with ink, the dry ink will clog the pores on the quill, and the small space is not suitable for washing it with water.

"Ao Guang, make all these feathers into the kind of pen just now." Because of the non-duplication of the feathers themselves, and the uncertainty of manual work with rough tools, Shu Hui did not ask Ao Guang to make some differences that could be compared.

Because when he does it, it must be very different.