Once upon a time in the Chu Kingdom, a landowner decided to reward his three hard-working servants with a pot of wine. His servants, all loving to drink wine, looked at each other in dismay.
"Master has only given us enough for a few mouthfuls each !" said the first.
"That's only enough for one of us to drink our fill," chimed in the third.
"Why don't we have a competition, whoever can draw a snake the fastest can have the whole jar of wine !" The first servant proposed, and with that each began drawing furiously.
The first servant was finished in the blink of an eye. Happily he snatched the wine jar and proudly crowed, "You are so slow, I'll even add feet to my snake before you are finished," and with the pot in this left hand, and with a flurry of his right hand he drew feet. At that moment another servant finished and grabbed the pot, "A snake has no feet - so what you drew is not a snake ! I am the first to draw a snake." Raising the pot he noisily slurped the wine, satisfied.
Sometimes like when the man added feet to a snake, which should have none, we can ruin the effect brought out by the simplicity with adding the superfluous.
Reference:
Zhongguo Gudai Yuyan Gushi
Image source:
http://characters.cultural-china.com
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