Xu Wen caught what Tian Qing threw and carefully examined it.
It was a round pen container, short and stocky. It seemed to have been dug out of the soil not long ago, and it was covered with loess.
Xu Wen peeled off a bit of the yellow mud shell and tried to identify the material underneath.
"Boxwood? The pen container is quite thick, but the material is still not big. What can this be changed to?"
Boxwood is extremely difficult to grow, usually only small, difficult to find large material.
The wooden box that Master Yao requested yesterday was plain and tidy. After it was cleaned up, it could be used for other purposes. However, the pen container had fewer uses.
"Look carefully." Tian Qing said indifferently.
Yellow mud and boxwood color is a bit similar, pen container buried in the soil for too long, the two are a bit difficult to distinguish each other. Can barely see that there are some patterns on the surface of the pen container, but the soil filled in the gap, the specific pattern is difficult to see clearly.
Xu Wen could only shake his head at Lian Tianqing after carefully identifying it for a long time.
"Follow me." Tian Qing said casually as he walked towards a corner of the courtyard.
When he got closer, Xu Wen discovered that there was a small wooden house here. It seemed to be made of old wood. It was not eye-catching at all in the pile of old wood.
The cabin was very small, less than three square meters in area, about the size of a toilet in a modern house.
Tian Qing walked over and pressed an unknown switch. The two walls of the wooden house suddenly fell down at the same time, and a large window opened on the other wall. The entire wooden house suddenly became very transparent.
Lian Tianqing walked in, Xu Wen following behind. Only then did he realize that the wooden house was filled with all kinds of tools. He immediately understood that this should be Lian Tianqing's workshop.
Tian Qing pressed a switch again. The floor opened and a thick wooden board came up. The planks spread out flat on either side, forming a workbench. There were many fixed wooden boxes on both sides of the table, filled with bottles and jars.
This series of changes dazzled everyone. Tian Qing took the pen container from Xu Wen and placed it on the wooden platform with a matter-of-fact look.
"Watch." Lian Tianqing casually said. He picked up a scraper and scraped off the obvious yellow soil on the pen container bit by bit.
He moved so quickly that the plaster fell down and in a flash the pen holder became a flat, short cylinder.
He put down his scraper and brushed away the dust with a brush. Then he changed his brush and dipped it in some unknown brown liquid. He cleaned it up bit by bit along the gaps in the pen container.
The hard soil mixed with the liquid and became a thick muddy water, which was brushed away by the brush.
Tian Qing was calm and composed. His left hand held the pen container and rotated it bit by bit. His right hand held the small brush and kept brushing it against the wall of the pen container.
Tian Qing's movements were skilled and agile, but even with the help of that liquid, the thick mud adhered tightly to the wall of the cylinder and was difficult to completely remove. He could only clean inch by inch, slowly and continuously.
This was a long process. Xu Wen stood aside and saw with his own eyes that the yellow mud disappeared bit by bit, and the patterns on the boxwood gradually became clearer.
This process brought with it an indescribable pleasure, as if the whole world had become exceptionally clear because of it.
After cleaning the outer wall, Tian Qing continued to clean the interior of the pen container.
In the end, Tian Qing wiped off all the remaining traces with a piece of dry cloth, waxed it, and handed it to Xu Wen.
Xu Wen received it in shock.
The pen container was still as chunky as before, but it gave people a completely different feeling.
The pen container was made of boxwood, with a layer of black paint painted on the inner wall and a poem carved on the outside.
Xu Wen gently rotated the pen holder, and the poem unconsciously came out of his mouth.
"Knowing Zhang riding a horse is like riding a boat, and his eyes fall into the bottom of the well." Ruyang three fights start to rise to the sky, drink like a whale sucking hundreds of rivers…"
The words were cursive, and some of the words were unclear, but he was familiar with this poem.
Du Fu's "Song of the Eight Immortals in Drinking" is engraved on this boxwood pen container, which adds a bit of scholarly atmosphere to it.
"Not bad, you can actually recite it." Lian Tianqing seemed to be a little surprised. Then, he asked," How's this writing?"
"This is…walking grass? The handwriting is beautiful and round. It's very beautiful."
Xu Wen had seen others evaluate calligraphy in books before. His words and sentences were all set in sets, which sounded gorgeous. But now it was him. After scratching his head and thinking of two adjectives, he could only say "good-looking" in an ordinary way.
Fortunately, he was only a thirteen or fourteen year old child. Tian Qing did not have high expectations for him.
He pointed to a corner behind the poem and asked him,"Can you tell what these two seals are?"
Xu Wen carefully identified them and could only recognize them as seal scripts. He could not recognize a single word of them.
He felt a little ashamed, but Tian Qing did not care.
"These two words above the square seal are the title. Qichang is Dong Qichang. The two seals below belong to him. One is Dong Qichang and the other is Scholar Zong Bo."
Dong Qichang was a famous calligrapher and painter in Ming Dynasty. His calligraphy had its own style. His painting and painting theory had great influence on the later times. Even Xu Wen had heard of his name.
He stared at the pen container and heard Lian Tianqing continue to say,"Xing Zhang Mi Dong, its Chang Lin Duo Pagoda, Jin, Tang, Song, Yuan family style of writing, its own." This song of the Eight Immortals in drinking is elegant and ethereal, and its elegance is self-contained. Good calligraphy requires good skill. This cylinder is very good in carving. It moves like a pen. It feels like it is done in one go. It is really the work of everyone."
"In other words, this pen container is actually very precious?" Ask them.
" Celebrity calligraphy, everyone carves. I don't know which collection has fallen out and been buried in the soil until now." Tian Qing's tone was indifferent, but there were some other meanings that he could not explain.
At this moment, Xu Wen understood completely.
Treating old wood as pure wood was his mindset that had been brought out during this period of time.
In fact, these old trees may have been just wood, but they were later made into some kind of object.
Most of them come from folk, even if they are depreciated, they are only waste wood. After treatment, they continue to be used in different ways. But some of them, made by skilled hands, are genuine collectibles, in other words antiques.
These were the most precious things in this old lumber yard, where the true value lay!
"What I am really good at is not carpentry. I've spent my life learning to restore these treasures. You take me as your teacher, and what you learn may not be as good as you think. Although you have followed me to worship Lu Ban, I can still give you another chance."
Tian Qing placed his hands behind his back as he stared at the pen container and spoke slowly. Finally he turned and asked--
"Are you really willing to become my disciple and learn these restoration skills from me?"
He stared at Xu Wen as if trying to read his true thoughts from his face.
Xu Wen's expression was also a little strange, as if he was surprised. As soon as Tian Qing's voice fell, he said without hesitation,"I'm willing!"
He was too straightforward. Even Tian Qing was stunned by him.
"Do you know what I'm talking about?"