The story is told in the vernacular, Zhuang Zhou, Zhuangzi, a native of Song during the Warring States period. He was too focused on writing books and making speeches, so he did not pay much attention to productive labor, which led to the family was very poor, and often did not have the money to buy food, and starved. One day, Zhuangzi's family reached the point where they could not cook, so he had no choice but to go to the house of the Marquis of Jianhe, who supervised the river, to borrow food.
The Hou of the river is a small official, usually loan sharks, love to take advantage of the cheap, is a very stingy people, but see so noble Zhuangzi can come to the door to ask for help, they quickly agreed, said: "I lend you grain of course, but I have to wait until after the collection of the people's rent and tax before lending you, do you think so?" When Zhuangzi saw that the Hou of Supervisory River was unwilling to lend the grain immediately, he was not happy in his heart, and thought to himself, "It's not like I'm borrowing it for nothing. He said to the Supervisor of the River in annoyance, "I walked a long way from my home yesterday to come to you, and when I was halfway along the road, I suddenly heard the sound of shouting for help. I immediately went towards the place where the sound was made, and at a glance, it turned out to be a small fish lying in a dry cart ditch calling for help." Zhuangzi sighed and continued, "When it saw me, it begged me for help as if it had met a savior. I rushed up to it then and asked, 'O little fish, why have you come here?' The little fish replied: 'I originally lived in the East China Sea, and today I had the misfortune to land in this car ditch, and am about to dry up, so please give me a liter and a half of bucket of water to save my life!'"
After listening to Zhuangzi's words, the Supervisor of the River Hou asked, "So you gave the water to rescue the little fish?" Zhuangzi said coldly: "I said at that time: 'Well, when I get to the south, I will go and persuade the kings of Wu and Yue to bring the water in the West River to relieve you, so that you can swim happily back to the East China Sea with the river, what do you think about that?'"
Upon hearing this, the Hou of the Supervisory River was immediately dumbfounded, and feeling very absurd at Zhuangzi's method of relief, he said, "How can that work?"
"Yes, when the carp heard my idea, it immediately opened its eyes wide with anger and said angrily, 'I can't live without the water I depend on. All I need now is to get a liter and a half bucket of water and I can live. If I had waited for you to draw water from the West River, I would have died here long ago. At that time, you can only look for me in the store selling dried fish.'"
The Supervisor of the River Hou blushed, then realized what Zhuang Zhou meant by this, and hurriedly asked the steward to borrow food.
"Dried up perch" is a fable from Zhuang Zhou, "dried up" is "water dried up", "rut" is the wheel on the road. The idiom of "perch" is from Zhuang Zhou's fable, "dry" is "water is dried up", "rut" is the mark of the wheel on the road, and "perch" is "carp". This idiom is usually used as a metaphor for people in dire need of relief in the midst of difficulties.
Its antonym is desperation.