During the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty, an anecdote occurred in Tongcheng County, Anhui Province, where the Prime Minister Zhang Ying and his neighbor Ye Xiucai were involved in a lawsuit over the land boundary for the foundation of the wall. Because Zhang Ying's family wanted to build a house, the land boundary was close to Ye's family. Ye Xiucai asked the Zhang family to leave a middle road for easy access. However, the Zhang family pointed out that the land deed of their home stated "Zhi Ye Wall". There was nothing wrong with building a wall according to the land deed. Even if a road was to be left, both families should move back a few feet. At this time, Zhang Ying was an official in Beijing, and his son Zhang Tingyu (a famous official in the Yongzheng and Qianlong dynasties) also passed the Jinshi examination. When he was an official in the court, the old housekeeper took care of the specific affairs of his hometown. As the saying goes: "The prime minister's family has seven officials." This old housekeeper felt that he was the head of the prime minister's family. Moreover, building the wall in this way was justified. The opinions of a poor scholar in the Ye family were not worth heeding. So a new wall was built along the root of the Ye family wall. This Ye Xiucai had a stubborn temper. When he saw that the Zhang family had built a wall, he couldn't swallow his anger. The scholar was able to write on his own, and a petition was sent to the county government and a lawsuit was started.
A poor scholar filed a lawsuit against the prime minister of the dynasty, and the reasons were not very good. His relatives and friends were worried about Ye Xiucai, fearing that he would suffer losses, and persuaded him to withdraw the lawsuit as soon as possible, but Ye Xiucai refused to listen and insisted on The lawsuit continues. As soon as the Zhang family's housekeeper saw that the matter was getting serious, he quickly wrote a letter and reported the matter to Zhang Ying in Beijing. Soon, I received a reply from Zhang Ying. There were not many words in the letter, only four lines of poetry: "A piece of paper is only for the wall, so why not let it be three feet tall? The Great Wall is still there today, but Qin Shihuang is nowhere to be seen."
The housekeeper read this poem Shi, after understanding his master's intention, came to Ye's house and told Ye Xiucai that the Zhang family was going to demolish the wall tomorrow and step back three feet to make way. Ye Xiucai thought he was teasing him and didn't believe it was the truth at all. The housekeeper showed Zhang Ying's poem to Ye Xiucai. Ye Xiucai was very moved after reading this poem, and even said: "The Prime Minister is very generous, and Prime Minister Zhang is really very generous."
The next morning, the Zhang family started to tear down the wall and retreated. Three feet. Ye Xiucai was very excited when he saw it, so he demolished the wall of his house and stepped back three feet. As a result, an alley of about 100 meters long and six feet wide was formed between the Zhang and Ye families, which was called "Six Feet Alley". It is said that this place became a historical attraction in Tongcheng County and has been preserved ever since.