The two came to the stall of the medicinal herb market, these wholesalers of medicinal materials are very familiar with the pharmacies in the city, and the pharmacies are purchased from this wholesale market, although Guizhitang has very little purchase, but after all, it is the owner of the family, and now the business is not good and the purchase is small, it does not mean that it will always be like this, and harmony can make money, so when they saw Zuo Shaoyang coming, they all got up to say hello, and a fat herb merchant was the most enthusiastic, and said with a smile: "Young Master Zuo is here?" What herbs to buy today? ”

"My friend went up to the mountain to pick some medicine and wanted to sell it, can he collect it?"

The medicinal herb merchant said happily: "Of course we accept it, what will we sell if we don't buy medicinal herbs?" Hehe, almost all of these medicinal materials on our stall were picked by the people who collected the medicine from the mountains and sold to us, and we want them in bulk and bulk! ”

Zuo Shaoyang was overjoyed, and asked, "Your medicinal materials are all picked from the mountains by the medicine pickers?" ”

"Pretty much."

"There's no one to grow medicinal herbs to sell?"

"Who planted that thing and what did it, there are no medicinal herbs on the mountain."

Zuo Shaoyang was excited in his heart, it turned out that almost all the medicinal materials in the early Tang Dynasty were picked from the mountains, and few people planted them. The large-scale planting of medicinal materials is definitely more time-saving and labor-saving than going up to the mountain to collect medicines, and the yield is high, and it can be produced on a large scale, and it can also be planted according to the supply and demand needs of the medicinal materials market, which can not be done by collecting medicines.

The medicinal herb merchant said: "Young Master Zuo, where are the medicinal herbs?" I'll see. ”

Zuo Shaoyang temporarily put down the thoughts in his heart, took the medicine basket in Miao Peilan's hand, put it on the side of the stall, and took out all the medicinal materials and put them on the ground: "Oh, that's all." ”

The herb merchant squatted down and fiddled: "Well, the herbs are not bad." He pinched his fingers and calculated, and said: "Since it was introduced by Young Master Zuo, I won't bargain, a fixed price, including twelve yuan, how about it?" ”

Miao Peilan was overjoyed, she didn't expect that the medicinal herbs she dug in the morning would be sold for twelve wen, and she might not be able to earn this amount by selling firewood in a few days. Zuo Shaoyang heard that the price was still fair, nodded and said, "Okay, give the money!" ”

The herb merchant took out the money bag, counted twelve copper coins and handed them to Miao Peilan. Said with a smile: "Girl, after collecting medicine in the future, come directly to my stall and sell it to me, the price I give you is definitely the highest in the entire tile market." Hey. ”

Miao Peilan nodded happily, took the money, turned her face to look at Zuo Shaoyang, counted out six coins, and handed it to Zuo Shaoyang.

Zuo Shaoyang was stunned for a moment: "What do you do to me?" ”

"If you dig it with me, I will naturally give you half of it."

"Haha, in vain you still call me Brother Zuo, why are you so divided? I want to get this money, so I won't teach you how to dig herbs. Alright, take it. "Pushed the money back.

Miao Peilan grabbed his hand and slapped the six cents in his hand: "I'm leaving!" ”

Zuo Shaoyang knew that Miao Peilan's surname was very stubborn, and she would not change what she recognized, since she believed that the two of them dug it together, she naturally had to give half to herself, but Zuo Shaoyang was not a person who easily admits defeat, so he stepped forward, grabbed her hand, and slapped the four cents in her hand: "Since you are serious, then we will be real, - I can only collect two cents." ”

"Why?" Miao Peilan was stunned.

"Of these medicinal herbs, only the first gastrodia was dug by me, and the rest were dug up by you personally."

"But, you instructed me, otherwise I wouldn't know."

Zuo Shaoyang deliberately said with a straight face: "I don't care, anyway, whoever digs it is who's whoever." You are stubborn and I am stubborn, I am the same as you, and I don't want things that don't belong to me! If you don't take these four cents, I'll throw them away! ”

Miao Peilan smiled gratefully and put the four coins into her arms: "Thank you, Brother Zuo!" ”

"Hehe, that's pretty much it." Zuo Shaoyang said with a smile: "You wait, I'll buy some medicine, you take it back to give your younger brother and second son eye medicine, this has to be used as soon as possible, and it can't be delayed for too long." ”

Miao Peilan agreed. Stand there and watch. Zuo Shaoyang glanced at the stall of the herb merchant, reached out and pulled a handful of medicine powder from a bag, twisted his fingers, and frowned: "Why are you so rough borax?" ”

The medicinal herb merchant said with a smile: "Zuo Shaoyang, borax is a stone, it is already very good to be able to grind it into such a small size, don't you believe it, go to the stalls and take a look, my borax is definitely the finest grinding, if you can find out what is thinner than me, how much I want!" ”

Zuo Shaoyang's heart moved, and he glanced at him: "That's it?" ”

"Of course, my fat man Dong said nothing."

"Hmm. How do you get it? ”

"Young Master Zuo, do you really have it?" Dong Fatzi's words were actually boastful, seeing Zuo Shaoyang like this, he didn't dare to say enough, and said with a smile: "It depends on the medicine, but I really don't believe that there can be anything finer than my borax." ”

Zuo Shaoyang checked purple quartz, natural copper, magnet and other gold-stone drugs respectively, and found that the crushed particles were coarser than borax, and obviously more difficult to crush, so he said: "I can crush these finer than yours, just like the powder of white flour!" ”

"Wouldn't it? Zuo Shaoyang, you are really joking. Hey. ”

Zuo Shaoyang also ignored him, and looked at the medicinal material stalls behind his back, Zuo Shaoyang talked to Dong Fatzi just now, and many of these medicinal material dealers also heard it, and inevitably boasted about their borax, but Zuo Shaoyang looked at it all the way, it is not good to say that the borax on other stalls is worse than Dong Fatzi, but it is also about the same rough, and it is the same as that of his own pharmacy, and the particles are the same size as millet grains. I suddenly had an idea in my heart, and I returned to the fat man's stall and said, "Okay, I'll go back and concoct it, and I'll show you when I'm done, it's definitely much finer than the one in your stall!" ”

"That's a good idea! If there is such a thing, then my Dong fat man is going to be decided! ”

Zuo Shaoyang nodded, took Miao Peilan out of Washi, and said: "Peilan, these medicines don't meet my needs, I have to process them myself, you go back first, my father said, we will go to your village the day after tomorrow to give Young Master Jia and Aunt Li a follow-up, I may not go tomorrow, I am afraid that it will take too long to affect the treatment of the second son's eyes, so let's do it, if you go up the mountain to dig medicine tomorrow and go down the mountain to the city to sell it, come to our Guizhitang, and I will give you the medicine." ”

Miao Peilan thanked her and left with the basket on her back.

Zuo Shaoyang returned to Guizhi Hall, Liang and Fennel were preparing dinner in the kitchen, Hou Pu and Zuo Gui were talking in the hall, the door of the pharmacy was ajar, and the two children of Soybean and Douhua were sitting on the threshold playing games. Seeing Zuo Shaoyang coming back, he yelled at the little squirrel to play.

Zuo Shaoyang couldn't care about this, and after asking for a while, he said to Zuo Gui: "Dad, I want to concoct a medicinal herb, maybe I can sell it for some money." ”

"What?" Zuo Gui didn't react for a while, "What concocted medicinal materials?" ”

"I found that the borax particles in Washi are very coarse, and I have a way to concoct very fine powdered borax, as well as other mineral medicinal materials, and the herb merchant Dong Fatzi said that he can accept it. This way we can earn some processing fees! ”

Zuo Gui obviously didn't believe it and snorted; "How do you know how to concoct it?"

"The bell doctor I talked about last time taught me."

Hou Pu was curious and asked, "What kind of bell doctor?" ”

Zuo Gui said: "Zhong'er said that he once gave a doctor who was dying of starvation a little food, and the doctor showed him a medical book with some prescriptions on it. ”

Hou Pu smiled, turned his face to Zuo Shaoyang and said: "Da Lang, people coax you to eat, think about it, that Ling Doctor is starving to death, and he still relies on you for relief, if he really wants to have this ability, why don't he make money himself?" Why did you fall to the point of asking for food? ”

Fennel also smiled: "No, my brother is too sincere." ”

Zuo Shaoyang ignored them and went straight into the concoction room.

Zuo Gui wanted to stop it, but his son-in-law was here, and in ancient times, he regarded his son-in-law as an outsider, and he didn't want to reprimand his children in front of outsiders, even if it was his son-in-law.

Zuo Gui closed the door, bolted the door from the inside, and began to concoct borax.

Before the Tang Dynasty, the hard mineral medicinal materials were directly calcined with fire, and then mashed, and the particles obtained were relatively coarse. The Song Dynasty has greatly improved the crushing method of mineral medicines, especially the crushing method of gold and stone medicinal materials such as purple quartz, which has made a leap forward, using calcined red vinegar quenching, crushing after thermal expansion and cold contraction, and then water flying. You can get a much finer powder than the gold and stone drugs concocted before the Tang Dynasty.

Shuifei is a kind of traditional Chinese medicine processing method, is to break the drug, put it in the milk bowl, add water, grind into a paste, and then add a large amount of water to stir, the coarse powder will sink, at this time immediately pour out the suspension, sink the coarse particles and then grind, so repeatedly, the use of coarse and fine powder in the water suspension of the surname, the insoluble minerals in water are prepared into very fine powder by repeated grinding. Finally, the impurities that cannot be suspended are discarded, the suspension is combined, and after standing, the precipitate is divided, and then ground and dispersed after low temperature drying, and the extremely fine powder can be obtained. It is generally used in ophthalmic drugs and other medicines that require a high level of powder.