画蛇添足

hua she tian zu: A poor man was putting a new roof on his home and enlisted the help of some other villagers. After a long day of work, the man offered up a jug of wine, not enough for all of the workers. He said: "I'll give the jug to the man who can draw a snake the fastest." One of the workers quickly drew a squiggly line in the dirt and believed, for a moment, he was done. He looked at some other workers around him, working hard and perfecting their drawings. Accordingly, the fast one began to add more detail to his snake--a few extra lines, giving the snake feet like a salamander. Before he could finish, the poor man approved the drawing of another worker: a simple drawing of a squiggly line. "But that's exactly what I drew!" the fast worker said. "That's not what I see here," said the poor man. "We all know snakes don't have feet."