A Painted Snake Makes a Man Sick

In the Jin Dynasty, there lived a man named Le Guang, who was very outgoing and friendly. One day Le Guang sent for one of his close friends since the friend had not turned out for long.

At the first sight of his friend, Le Guang realized that something must have happened to his friend for his friend had no peace of mind all the time. So he asked his friend what was the matter. “It was all because of that party held at your home. At the party, when we raised the wine glasses, I noticed that there was a little snake lying in the wine and I felt particularly sick. Since then, I lay in bed unable to do anything.”

Le Guang was very puzzled at the matter. He looked around and then saw a bow (弧状物) with a painted snake hung on the wall of his room. So Le Guang laid the table at the original place and asked his friend again to have a drink. When the glass was filled with wine, he pointed to the shade of the bow in the glass and asked his friend to see. His friend observed nervously, “Well, well, that is what I saw last time. It is the same snake.” Le Guang laughed and took off the bow on the wall. “Could you see the snake anymore?” he asked. His friend was surprised to find that the snake was no longer in the wine. Since the whole truth had come out, his friend recovered from his illness right away.

For thousands of years, the story has been told to advise people not to be too suspicious unnecessarily.

There was a pilot and three people in a small plane. Suddenly there was something wrong with the plane when it was flying in the air. The smoke was everywhere in the plane. The pilot told the people there were only three parachutes (降落伞). They all became worried and started to make excuses.“I must go and mend the machine.” said the pilot, taking one of the parachutes. There was nothing he could do so he just jumped out. The next person said, “I must have a parachute. I am a very clever person, and I have to take part in an important sports game. I know I am going to win the game because I am going to be the cleverest person there.” He picked up a pack and jumped out. Two men were left(留了下来), an old businessman and a young mountain climber. By this time the plane was going down fast. The businessman said, “Young man, I am old but you’re still young. You take the last parachute.” The young mountain climber smiled, “Don’t worry,” he said, “we can both jump to safety because there are still two parachutes. Just now the clever person jumped out with my backpack.”