Nanjing, Baoxinglong cloth line.

As soon as the shopkeeper Yu Zudeng removed the door panel, he saw several cloth merchants standing outside, and hurriedly nodded and smiled: "A few masters, please come inside!" ”

"Well said, well said!" The cloth merchant arched his hand and smiled.

Yu Zudeng was suddenly confused, and he couldn't figure out why these living ancestors were polite to him.

In the cloth sales link, the early stage is mainly divided into cloth shops and cloth merchants.

The cloth shop is the buyer of fabrics, and there are three points of sitting and out of the village.

The village chooses to set up shop in the town, and the woman weaves cotton yarn and cotton cloth to sell, and generally rarely pays in cash. The woman sells cotton yarn, and the cloth shop gives cotton; The woman sells cotton cloth, and the cloth shop gives cotton yarn. In this way, the cloth shop can reduce the financial pressure, and the woman does not have to go elsewhere to buy raw materials.

When they left the village, they sent men to the villages and towns to buy, and the peasants could sell yarn and cloth without going to the city. However, this kind of transaction is very powerful in price reduction, and the black-hearted tooth line can even be pressed by three or four percent.

As for cloth merchants, they come to the cloth shop to buy goods wholesale, and then ship them to other places for retail.

There is a saying: The tooth shop serves the cloth merchant like a prince, and the cloth merchant is like a rivalry.

It is in front of the cloth shop that the cloth merchant is like a living ancestor. In order to compete for a cloth merchant, several cloth shops are like fighting.

So Yu Zudeng wondered today, why were the ancestors of the cloth merchants so polite?

"Xiaoyu, go make a few bowls of tea!"

Zhou Ruodou, the shopkeeper of the cloth shop, came to the lobby with a smile and gave Yu Zudeng two orders.

Then the shopkeeper said, "Please be seated." ”

A cloth merchant just sat down, and without waiting for the tea to come, he said directly: "Gossip Huti, I will raise the price by half to take the cloth." Not limited to plain weave, twill, summer cloth, pulp cloth, all of them raise the price by half, how much to take. ”

"Half of the price increase also want to take the cloth? I'll raise the price by one percent! The other cloth merchant scoffed.

Shopkeeper Zhou Ruodou was proud in his heart, and then complained bitterly: "Recently, there has been a shortage of fabrics, and I really can't make up so much." Why don't we follow the example of the Ministry of War to buy fabrics and have a secret bidding? The Ministry of War won the bid for the one with the lowest price, and we won the bid with the highest price. ”

"Yes, let's do it. If you can't do it here, I'll go to Jiangxi and Hunan to have a look. A cloth merchant said impatiently.

The small cloth shop even bids to sell cloth.

After the business was done, the shopkeeper Yu Zudeng was curious: "Shopkeeper, why is this year's cloth so good?" ”

Zhou Ruodou explained with a smile: "Japan opened its port this year, and I heard that two ports will be added. In the past, Japan's business was dominated by Fujian maritime merchants. Now that the ports have been opened, the maritime merchants of Jiangsu and Zhejiang have asked merchants everywhere to help them get the goods. Not only cotton, but also tea, silk, porcelain, tobacco, candles...... Take everything, anyway, you have to rely on a large quantity and low price, and grab business in what Iwami and Shimonoseki. The cotton cloth in the south of the Yangtze River was swept away by the cloth merchants, and they went to Nanjing to buy the goods. ”

Yu Zudeng was puzzled: "There are so many things in Japan, can you eat so many goods?" ”

"In addition to Japan, there are also Korea and Liaodong," Zhou Ruodou said, "Your Majesty canonized the king of Korea, and the ports of the whole country of Korea are opened." No matter how small and poor North Korea is, it is also a country, and it is still very cold, and cotton cloth must be easy to sell. There is also Liaodong, which has a small population, but there are a lot of garrisons. The military uniforms of the soldiers are distributed by the military department, but the daily clothing of the soldiers and their families is bought at their own expense. There are also Henan, Shandong, and Beizhili, and this year's business is also recovering, and even cloth merchants under Li Zicheng have come to purchase. Now that there is a shortage of goods everywhere, what do you think those cloth merchants are worried about? In the past, cloth merchants lowered prices and pressed us into grandsons. Now that the cloth merchant has raised the price, we have all become grandfathers. ”

Yu Zudeng suddenly realized: "It's still the shopkeeper's vision is wide, we can't imagine such a reason." ”

Zhou Ruodou stroked his beard and smiled: "These are all blessings thanks to Your Majesty." In the past few years, soldiers in various places have suffered disasters one after another, and countless casualties have been killed and injured in the north. The business of selling cloth in our south is not good, not to mention Nanjing, that is, Susong Changhu, and some weaving mills are closed. After His Majesty ascended the throne, business was getting better and better. The population of the south is growing day by day, and the north is about to settle down, and many immigrants are moving north, where do they not need to be clothed? There are also Japan, North Korea, and Liaodong, which are big business. You kid is good at doing things, I will give the owner a few good words, and let you be the fourth shopkeeper of the cloth industry in two years. ”

"Thank you, shopkeeper!" Yu Zudeng was overjoyed.

Zhou Ruodou said with a smile: "Your father saved my life, you are also smart, can write and calculate, follow me to work hard, in short, you will not suffer." ”

Yu Zudeng bent down to serve tea and said, "Uncle Zhou, please drink tea!" ”

Zhou Ruodou skimmed the tea powder with the lid of the bowl, and said with emotion: "We have a good life, we have met the Wise Sage." What days did you spend in previous years? The common people can't afford to eat, where do they dare to wear new clothes? Even in the Yin Shi family, there are people who sew and mend to make do, and they can't sell much fabric all year round. Today's business is getting better every day. If Your Majesty is asked to occupy all the north, then it will be really better. ”

"No, Your Majesty is really a good emperor." Yu Zudeng said with a smile.

Zhou Ruodou thought to himself: Your Majesty is all right, but he doesn't know that men are inferior to women, so that women are also perverse. In the past two years, the business has been good, and the money in my hands is also rich, I wanted to take a concubine, but I couldn't find a suitable person!

The north is plagued by wars, natural disasters and plagues, and the population is scarce, especially women.

When the Datong government organized immigration, female immigrants were given special treatment. As long as they take the initiative to sign up, the government will give women a leave fee, which will be doubled directly on the basis of male immigration.

Even some prostitutes on the banks of the Qinhuai River have signed up to move to the north. Because they heard that once they arrived in the north, they would not worry about getting married at all. In the countryside, you can divide the fields, in the city, you can divide the houses, and in the county where the population is particularly scarce, you can even get the shops!

In such a situation, who wants to be a concubine?

used to be a concubine for rich people, although she was despised on the surface, but secretly she was envied. Now, whether openly or secretly, concubines must be despised.

It's good that the husband's family has an official status, but if he is just an ordinary rich man and wants to marry a concubine, he will definitely be considered greedy for enjoyment and lazy.

Zhou Ruodou, the shopkeeper of the cloth shop, asked the matchmaker to look for a year, but he couldn't even find a suitable concubine.

Zhou Ruodou sighed: "Chongzhen was really good at that time, he could take a concubine for a few taels of silver." In the years of famine, there is no need to give out any silver, and a few buckets of rice can be exchanged for one. The old man also accepted a concubine, gentle and virtuous, but unfortunately died in childbirth. ”

Yu Zudeng's mind was not about taking concubines, he said: "Shopkeeper, I heard that there are many textile factories on the side of Susong Changhu. In the past two years, there have also been textile factories in the east of Nanjing. They used new spinning machines and new looms, and they were able to spin and spin faster and earn more money. Why don't you give the owner an idea and ask the owner to open a textile factory in the east of the city? ”

Zhou Ruodou said angrily: "We are a cloth shop, we buy fabrics, not spin them ourselves." Do your old job and don't think about what you don't have. ”

Yu Zudeng said: "Those textile factories, the woven fabrics, there are cloth merchants who come to buy them, and they don't worry about selling them at all, and they don't ask our cloth shop to help sell them." ”

"That's bad rules!"

The more Zhou Ruodou said, the more angry he became: "Since the Jiajing period, there has been a cotton cloth guild in Jinling. At that time, the proprietors of the whole city sat together and made a charter. Cloth merchants from other places can only find cloth shops to sell cloth. Which cloth merchant dares to break the rules, the whole city cloth shop will not sell cloth to him! At that time, even if someone opened a textile workshop, the woven cotton cloth had to be sold by the cloth shop. ”

Yu Zudeng asked, "Why don't you have this rule now?" ”

Zhou Ruodou sighed: "Alas, during the Chongzhen period, the cloth business was not good. Those cloth merchants are all living ancestors, and it's not up to them to decide what they want to do? Now that the business of the cloth shop is doing well, His Majesty is not allowed to make such a rule, saying that it is a monopoly of the industry. ”

Yu Zudeng said with a smile: "Your Majesty has few rules, and it is not allowed to have many rules among the people. Earlier, without the permission of the government, private businessmen were not allowed to have flower buildings, and now there are more and more flower buildings in Nanjing. ”

Hualou, the scientific name is "Zhiyun brocade jacquard machine", with a total of 1924 parts.

Yun brocade is a royal tribute, the emperor's dragon robe, the queen's phoenix robe, are all sewn with cloud brocade. Even if the control of the imperial court declined at the end of the Ming Dynasty, and if you want to buy a flower building and textile cloud brocade, you also need to be taken care of by the government.

Now, the Datong Imperial Court no longer restricts, but encourages merchants to weave Yunjin.

Nanjing quickly became the center of Yunjin textile, and in just a few years, the Yunjin looms inside and outside the city developed to three or four thousand. Moreover, it is constantly increasing, solving the employment problem of tens of thousands of people.

Many wealthy people among the people also wore cloud brocade, after all, it used to be the material of dragon robes and phoenix clothes.

Even, the word "Yunjin" was named by Zhao Han. Because you have to enter the royal warehouse in Daming, it is called Kujin and Kusatin.

The Japanese envoy Lin Luoshan saw Yunjin some time ago, and his eyes were already straight at that time.

Lin Luoshan had also seen brocade before, but Yun brocade was the best among brocades. Since the Yuan Dynasty, it can only be used exclusively by the royal family, and at most it will be given to ministers who have made meritorious contributions.

Because he liked it too much, Lin Luoshan also wanted to learn technology secretly and went to the Yunjin manufacturing factory to wander around.

But the more you turn the sillier and sillier the 1924 parts of the cloud brocade loom. Not to mention stealing learning, even if you explain it to him carefully, it will take a month or two to understand it a little.

The British writer Peter Mundy recorded Yunjin in this book: "The nobles of European countries thought that silk was a creation of God and a rare treasure in the world. They certainly couldn't understand, or even imagine, the existence of Yunjin. Forgive me for my limited vocabulary, or in other words, there is not an adjective in the English vocabulary that can express the beauty and nobility of Yunjin......"

"It is said that the machine that makes Yunjin is made up of tens of thousands of parts. A Chinese official told me that Yunjin was an ancient emperor called Liu Yu, who had taken prisoners from Chang'an to thousands of craftsmen during the Northern Expedition that destroyed the country called Qin. These craftsmen combined the textile skills of the Han, Wei, Jin, and many steppe peoples (Sixteen Kingdoms). It took thousands of years of refinement to finally give birth to this beautiful textile. ”

"I had the heart to spend silver to make a cloud brocade garment. The moment I put it on, I felt more noble than the emperors and kings of Europe......"