"See this? My salt is even better than what they sell at the supply and marketing cooperative." The peddler began to boast, holding up his goods.
There was no refined salt back then, only coarse salt. The only way to judge its quality was to see how white the grains were and how many impurities they contained.
Yuan Si didn't know how to judge it; she couldn't tell good from bad at all. However, she could see that the salt grains weren't very clean, though she didn't know if salt from other places was the same. Still, she couldn't let him see her ignorance. She picked up a few grains and studied them intently for a moment before nodding to show they were acceptable.
"If you're trading for salt, how about I give you a *jin* and four-tenths? What do you say?" the peddler asked, his mind already working on his own little scheme.
