Extended reading:

Buy bamboo slips and return pearls

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Raft: wooden box. Return: Return. Buy the box and return the pearls. Metaphor has no vision and improper choice.

Origin of idioms

Some Chu people sold their pearls to Zheng, Mulan's cabinet, decorated with cinnamon, pearls and jadeite, and decorated with roses and jadeite. Zheng Guoren bought the jewelry box and returned the pearls. This can be said to be a best seller, but it is not a good pearl. Conversations in this world are all controversial words, and people forget to use them after reading them. (Han Feizi in the Warring States Period "Han Feizi, Foreign Storage, Upper Left")

Later generations refined the idiom "buy gifts and return pearls".

Idioms and their stories

During the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period, there was a jeweler in the State of Chu. He often travels between Chu and Zheng, doing some jewelry business. One day, he prepared some jewels and planned to sell them to Zheng. In order to attract customers and sell them at a good price, he thought of a good way. He chose some excellent wood, asked craftsmen to make exquisite and novel wooden boxes, and asked skilled sculptors to carve various exquisite patterns on the outside of the boxes. At the same time, he chose different precious spices to make the box emit charming fragrance. The box is ready. It looks golden and smells charming. This is really a rare work of art. He thought that if the jewels were put in these boxes, it would definitely attract Zheng's people. Maybe they would scramble to buy his own jewels, and then they would make a lot of money.

The jeweler carefully put the jewels in a special box and left Zheng with confidence. After arriving in Zheng, he displayed his jewels in a bustling market. Not surprisingly, shortly after the exhibition, many Zheng people gathered to admire his jewelry box. Seeing more and more guests gathered, he was secretly happy and thought that he would make a lot of money.

To his surprise, these Zheng people are not interested in his jewelry, but in the wooden box with jewelry. They are in groups of three, and the topic of discussion is how special the style is and how beautiful the decoration is. This inevitably made him sweat on his forehead. In order to turn people's attention to jewelry, the jeweler screamed at the top of his lungs about how beautiful his jewelry was, but everyone around him turned a deaf ear and still cared about the box containing jewelry.

At this time, Guo picked up the box, studied it carefully, liked it very much, and bought it at a high price. The jeweler was very excited to see a customer finally come to his house. After some bargaining, Zheng Guo gave the money to the jeweler and left with the box. But he just took a few steps, but he turned back. The jeweler thinks he has changed his mind and wants to return the jewels. Who knows that the man walked up to the jeweler, carefully opened the box, took out the jewels inside and handed them to the jeweler, saying, "I left in a hurry just now, but I didn't find any jewels in the box." You must have put it there, sir. I'm here to return the jewels. "

After returning the jewels to the jeweler, Zheng Guoren left happily, muttering, "This wooden box is beautiful, but I earned it." The jeweler took the jewels sent back by Zheng people and was surprised from ear to ear. He thought that the man liked his jewelry, but he didn't expect that the wooden box he prepared was too delicate and stole the limelight of the jewelry, which really made the jeweler smile! It seems that I am not suitable for selling jewelry, but more suitable for selling wooden boxes.

Idiom implication

Zheng people only stared at the exquisite wooden cases and gave up precious jewels. It can be seen that things must be clearly defined, and people who buy gifts and return pearls can't just pay attention to the appearance of things without seeing the essence of things. Only by seeing the essence of things clearly and prioritizing can we make appropriate choices. The idiom originally meant to put back the wooden box bought to hold pearls; The metaphor is improper choice, and the secondary things are better than the main ones.