During the Spring and autum period (春秋 chūn qiū,770 - 221BC),Confucius (kǒng zǐ 孔子) and a group of his apprentices traveled a number of countries delivering speeches concerning polictical issues and ritual principles. What he sought to do was transimiting his knowledge as well as gain the trust from the kings of these coutries so as to administrate the realm in his way. But things were never as optimistic as he thought to be. All of the emperors chose not to identify with Confucius since his suggestions seemed quite conservertive to them.

One day,after being deeply frustrated again by the leader of Lu Guo (lǔ guó 鲁国),Confucius and his followers went to Zheng Guo (zhèng guó 郑国) to have another try.Unfortunately,as soon as they arrived the coutry,Confucius strayed away from his students and decided to wait for them at the capital’s north gate lonely.

Meanwhile,the students hurried to look for their respected teacher. One of the passerbys came forward and asked curiously:"You seemed so wooried ,are you looking for some one urgertly?""Yes,sir",One of students said in a anxious tone"Our teacher was lost some time earlier,did you ever saw him?"The kind citizen then said:"I did saw a little bit weird old man at the north gate,in a low spirit and out of sort ,just looked like a stray dog.Was that your teacher?"

春秋时期，孔子带领他的学生到各诸侯国讲学，因孔子是保守派，与当时诸侯争霸不合拍，常常受到冷遇。

一天，孔子和他的一行弟子又来到郑国。不料，在都城的东门外，孔子和他的弟子们走 散了，只好孤零零地站在城门下等候。他的弟子子贡焦急地到处寻找孔子。有个郑国人问他找谁，他急切地说：“喔，我在找我的老师，不知你见到过他吗?” 那郑国人回答说：“东门口有个老头儿，非常古怪。他那没精打采的样子，活像一条居丧人家的狗，不知他是否是你的老师?”子贡赶紧来到东门。找到了孔子，如实地将那郑国人的话说了，孔子听后笑着说：“他说我像丧家之犬吗？”

丧家之犬 (sàng jiā zhī quǎn)
【翻译】feel lost like a stray dog.
【释义】无家可归的狗。比喻无处投奔，到处乱窜的人。
【例句】这些可怜人被野蛮的侵略者赶出了家园，他们就像丧家之犬一样，失去了依靠。
【近义词】过街老鼠、漏网之鱼
【反义词】 耀武扬威