During the Ming Jiajing period, one day, a thief surnamed Zhao stole several old hens from an old woman's house. He was caught by the old woman's son, Ah Qiang, and sent all the way to the county yamen.

Recently, cases of chicken theft have occurred frequently in that area, and some people even sleep in the chicken shed day and night, but it is difficult to stop thieves. So this time, everyone asked the county magistrate to kill an example.

After hearing the report, the county magistrate looked at Thief Zhao, who was kneeling in the hall, and asked Thief Zhao to look up and ask, "It seems that you are also a shrewd person, why would you do such a bad thing?"

Thief Zhao thought for a while and argued: "The villain is really forced by life, it is a last resort!"

"Oh," the county magistrate pondered for a while and said, "if you are really forced by life, I might as well show you a way out. In my opinion, there is a job that is easy to learn and earns a lot of money. You can try it."

"What work?"

"Spinning!"

Thief Zhao chuckled. Seeing the dignified look on the county magistrate's face, he hurriedly covered his mouth. "Thank you for exonerating me.

The county magistrate immediately ordered someone to buy a catty of cotton, and the official taught Zhao Thief to spin, saying, "When you learn it, I will let you out."

Everyone saw that the county magistrate not only did not punish the thief for the crime, but pointed out a way for him to live, so they were very angry, but they did not dare to talk too much, so they had to leave the county yamen angrily.

Besides, Thief Zhao, although he didn't take the right path, he was very smart and quickly mastered the skills of spinning yarn, spinning that catty of cotton into yarn. The county magistrate was very satisfied, and he took the yarn to the market to sell, and then gave the money to Thief Zhao, who enlightened him: "I only used 100 pennies to buy a catty of cotton, but sold it for more than 500 pennies. Excluding the cost of your meal, there are still 300 pennies left. Young man, when you go back, you can use it as capital and live on this craft."

Thief Zhao nodded like a chicken pecking at rice, took the money, kowtowed to the county master, and then ran out of the county yamen like a fly.

However, he didn't expect that after only three days, Thief Zhao found the spinning work hard, and his old skills were itchy. Unfortunately, he was captured and sent to the county yamen. The county magistrate originally wanted to set a typical example, but now he was very annoyed, but on second thought, he felt that he would give Thief Zhao another chance, so he let him spin yarn in prison while reflecting on it.

Who knew that a month later, this guy was sent again because he stole other people's chickens? The county magistrate was not polite this time, and said with a straight face: "You have entered the county yamen three times. There is an old saying that things are but three, it seems that you don't give you any power, you don't know how many eyes Prince Ma has!"

After saying that, he called two yamen servants, set up Thief Zhao, and walked quickly through the hall, while he himself started by counting one, two, or three. When he counted to a thousand, he ordered: "Stop!"

Thief Zhao's head turned dizzy, and he didn't know what kind of punishment this was. In his surprise, he only heard the county magistrate ask the official to hand over a large bowl of hot vinegar and order him to drink it up on the spot. Thief Zhao thought to himself: Why did the county magistrate do such a strange trick! However, drinking vinegar should not be a problem. Thinking of this, he took the bowl and drank it "Gudong, Gudong". Who knew that just after drinking half of it, someone suddenly slapped him from behind, and he was shocked, choked on vinegar and coughed loudly.

After that, Thief Zhao couldn't stop coughing, and at night, whenever he thought of stealing, he would definitely cough. It was impossible to be a thief again; later, he tried many ways to seek medicine, but it was always ineffective. In this way, Thief Zhao really had to rely on spinning yarn to get by.

This matter has been passed down ten times, and the chicken theft case that was once rampant has gradually disappeared.

The people applauded one after another, and Ah Qiang even went to the county yamen to thank the master. It happened that the civil servant was also there that day. The civil servant asked the county magistrate, "Where did the lord learn this method?"

The county magistrate smiled slightly: "You forget, I am not only punished when I encounter evil, but also used to take good things. I might as well tell you, I heard it from an old man. When I had a drink with him, he accidentally said this, so I tried it on the surname Zhao, and it worked as soon as I used it. Oh, this habitual thief can't be broken by playing the board, only this method can be used!"

After saying that, everyone laughed.