She had washed her own brush and was just about to pour the remaining ink from the inkstone when Wan Rou coincidentally lifted the curtain and blocked her path with a smile: "Where is the logic of letting the young lady do it herself? Wan Ting, who doesn't know her limits, actually ran off on her own."
Xu Mingwei then let her take care of it, she had gone to look at the words she had written before, to compare them after flipping through the words she had written two days ago. Originally, the words she had been dissatisfied with were still unsatisfactory, they were soft and did not have a proper pattern, it seemed that she had to train for a while more before she could see her.
Wan Rou didn't want to learn from her, so she didn't want to waste her time. Besides, it was useless to be able to read. If one was not able to work in the Xu Residence, then he would not have to earn a lot more money to be able to read than if he could not read. Instead of following Wan Ting and the others to read, the three of them followed the young mistress to learn. Didn't they pile all the work in that room onto her?
Wan Yi was the first to jump out, and said, "How can we do that, there are a lot of paper and pens in our house. It is already kind of us servants to be able to learn to read from a lady, and we even need the things in a girl's room. We really aren't human."
Wan Rong followed and said, "Wan Yi is right, these papers and pens look unremarkable, and it will be a big deal as time goes by, I should earn some silver for my work, but I definitely did not have the principle of letting the young lady hide herself from the servants. This paper, pen and silver, it's all up to the servants to pay for themselves. "
Seeing that she could not persuade them, Xu Mingwei thought that it would be fine as long as they could read a few words, they did not need to buy ink and paper like her. As she thought about it, Wan Rong and the others only started learning, it would be enough to make a sand table. Previously, when they were making the sandbags for her, they had even washed them a little, filled them up with a wooden board, and didn't even need a single cent.
Xu Mingwei told the four girls his plan, and everyone thought that it would work. Before she even opened her mouth to assign the tasks, Wan Ting had already dragged Wan Rou to the storage room to look for a wooden lattice.
Wan Rong thought that it would not be good to let the girls casually break willow branches and write on the sand table, if anyone saw them, they would say that the people of moon-nesting were poor and could not afford good stuff, just as she was hesitating on what to replace them with, Xu Mingwei had already found four old brushes from the small study room.
"Take this and use it first, it's also important to practice the hand holding position right from the start. Although using the tree branches is convenient, once you get used to it, it's hard to correct it again." Xu Mingwei said indifferently.
Wan Rong saw that the brushes had indeed been written by the young master — — The brushes outside did not have much skill, the life span of the brush was not long, so she did not reject it, and extended her hand to receive it.
Not long after, Wan Ting had already excitedly carried the wooden board back, and behind him was Wan Rou who was in so much pain that it seemed as if her heart had been cut off.
"600 years old red sandalwood? This servant told her to choose another one, but she didn't agree. Miss, quickly tell me about her. How could she be so contemptuous!" Wan Rou felt his heart bleeding as he heard the aggrieved voice of the red sandalwood.
"But the others aren't old enough. Besides, they are clean and can only hold a bit of sand. We sisters should be more careful, so how could that be considered bad?" Wan Ting curled her lips in disapproval and argued.
Xu Mingwei smiled as she watched the two girls bickering in her room. She said, "If you guys want something to be made for other people, it would be inconvenient for them to even write with small squares. You guys should be more careful, just use a bad photo to compensate."
With just one sentence, Wan Rou was silenced.
Wan Rou glared at Wan Ting unhappily, as she said, "It's all because of you, what are you trying to do, how can I compensate you if you use it badly?"
Although Wan Ting felt guilty in her heart, she still glared at her, unwilling to be outdone.
Xu Mingwei laughed in her heart, it was just a few small red sandalwood toys, if they were bad, then they were bad. Although Wan Rou liked to be fussy and take advantage of things, she was extremely good at cherishing things. She was the one in charge of the things in the moon-nesting's small warehouse. Every year, Xu Mingbai and would give her two things, and in addition to the things that were given to her by Lady Helan and Xu Tiangang, she would remember every single thing clearly in the book, and every single thing was arranged neatly in order. Compared to her, the small flaw in her personality was not that eye-catching.
Wan Rou and Wan Ting, the happy enemies, had only just started talking when Wan Yi and Wan Rong brought the sand in. The two of them immediately forgot that they were still staring at each other in anger, they touched their heads and filled the sand into the wooden board, then lifted it up and shook it, using their fingers to draw a line, and then holding and shaking it again, the mark disappeared.
This method was indeed useful. Even Wan Rong, the person with the most stable personality among the four of them, couldn't help but try the sand table several times.
Xu Mingwei took the chance to allow the brushes to be distributed to everyone while they were still fresh in their minds. She herself took the sand table and wrote the words "One", "Two", "Three".
"What does the girl write here? The crossroads is very interesting. " Wan Rou came closer to take a look, and asked curiously.
"Is it the number one, two, or three?" This servant girl is right? " Wan Yi raised her head and laughed.
Before Xu Mingwei could reply, Wan Ting had already exclaimed, "Then doesn't that mean that those with the surname Wan will be writing their names until nightfall?"
The girls in the room were laughing so hard that they were about to cry. Wan Yi pointed at her but was unable to say anything, her stomach aching even more.
Even the dispirited Xu Mingwei had a rare smile plastered on her face as she listened to Wan Ting's joke.
Seeing that everyone was laughing so unhappily, Wan Ting knew that she had said the wrong thing. Her face was red and hot as she hid behind Wan Rong, not daring to come out.
"Alright, alright. All of you take a break. If you keep laughing, will you all still be learning these words?" In the end, Wan Rong was the one who was kind and helped her out.
Xu Mingwei saw that everyone had slowed down, and pointed to the words on the sand table, "Wan Yi is right, these three words are the numbers one, two, three, from the fourth person, it's a completely different method of writing. "You guys can practice these three first. You can learn anything else after you flatten your character."
Wan Ting thought to herself, it's just drawing a few lines on the sand, isn't it simple? They also heard Xu Mingwei talking about how to hold the brushes. The few of them usually served in the small study room, even though they had never eaten pork before, they had seen a pig running before. Xu Mingwei had only taught them once before, and all four of them held the correct positions.
"The wrist is in the air, the tip of the pen should be straight. Right, it's exactly like how Wan Rong is right now …"
Wan Ting had just lost face, and was wholeheartedly trying to regain her dignity, but she didn't expect that this matter, which was extremely simple in her eyes, would actually be completely different from this. She clearly held the brush well, but when she wrote on the sand table, she lost control of the brush. The brush she wrote looked like an earthworm crawling across the sand table. It was crooked and was simply too horrible to look at.
She sneaked into the sand table of the other three to check on someone else. Seeing that there were earthworms crawling all over the sand table, she was finally able to comfort herself a little.
"Miss, this is really difficult. Can you change to a different method to hold the brush?" Wan Rou asked in frustration.
"You can only shake it like this. You're definitely not used to writing at the beginning, just practice more." Xu Mingwei looked at the words everyone had written, and replied without even raising her head.
The few of them suddenly remembered that Xu Mingwei usually held a brush in this way too. Her hand of writing was not as crooked as theirs, and they suddenly had a bit of fighting spirit in their hearts. They all picked up their pens and started practicing.
Seeing that the four of them were busy drawing lines on the sand table, a light smile surfaced on the corner of Xu Mingwei's mouth. Born in this world, although there was no longer any computer television, it was easy for one's eyes to be damaged when looking at books with vertical typography every day. Besides, there were no electric lamps here. Even a rich family like the Xu Estate would only have a few candles and a few oil lamps at night compared to a poor family. Compared to the electric lamps, it was not that bright.