When Confucius was in Wei state, one day he went out with Zilu. There were some pheasants on the roadside which interested them, so they stopped to watch. The birds noticed them, so they flew up, wheeled in the air for a while, and stopped at another place. Seeing this, Confucius thought that the pheasants were free to stop at anywhere they want, but he had to travel around all the time and had not been able to find a governor with real virtue. So he sighed and said, "These pheasants know the current affairs better than people!" Zilu listened respectfully and bowed solemnly for several times to thank the master for his teachings.