徑上普陀 The Journey to Potalaka
行者即縱觔斗雲，徑上南海。咦！那消半個時辰，早望見普陀山境。須臾間，墜下觔斗，到紫竹林外，又只見那二十四路諸天上前迎著道：「大聖何來？」行者道：「我師有難，特來謁見菩薩。」諸天道：「請坐，容報。」那輪日的諸天徑至潮音洞口報道：「孫悟空有事朝見。」菩薩正與捧珠龍女在寶蓮池畔扶欄看花，聞報，即轉雲巖，開門喚入。大聖端肅皈依參拜。行者即纵觔斗云，径上南海。咦！那消半个时辰，早望见普陀山境。须臾间，坠下觔斗，到紫竹林外，又只见那二十四路诸天上前迎着道：「大圣何来？」行者道：「我师有难，特来谒见菩萨。」诸天道：「请坐，容报。」那轮日的诸天径至潮音洞口报道：「孙悟空有事朝见。」菩萨正与捧珠龙女在宝莲池畔扶栏看花，闻报，即转云岩，开门唤入。大圣端肃皈依参拜。
逐句解 Line by line
The Pilgrim at once mounted his somersault cloud and went straight for the Southern Sea. Ai! In less than half a double-hour he had already caught sight of the region of Mount Potalaka.
The 觔斗雲 (斗 dǒu) covers the distance in 那消半個時辰, 'not half a double-hour' (那 nà) — a 時辰 being one of the twelve two-hour divisions the Chinese day was cut into, so under an hour of our reckoning. 普陀山 is Mount Potalaka, Guanyin's island in the Southern Sea. The same mobility the pilgrims spent a whole scene arguing about is here simply used, without comment.
In an instant he dropped from his somersault, arrived outside the Purple Bamboo Grove, and saw the deva-guardians of the Twenty-Four Quarters come forward to meet him, saying:
紫竹林, the Purple Bamboo Grove, is Guanyin's own precinct (斗 dǒu), and the 二十四路諸天 are the deva-guardians of the twenty-four quarters (那 nà, 著 zhe) — the reception committee of a sacred court. The prose slows right down here, and the change of pace after the churning river is deliberate.
'What brings the Great Sage here?' The Pilgrim said: 'My master is in peril, and I have come expressly to seek audience with the Bodhisattva.' The devas said:
我師有難, 'my master is in trouble' — and 難 is nàn, the calamity reading, exactly as it was in the chapter's opening line. 謁見菩薩, 'to seek audience with the Bodhisattva,' is the formal language of a petitioner at court, and the monkey uses it correctly.
'Please be seated, and allow us to announce you.' The deva on duty that day went straight to the mouth of the Tide-Sound Cave and reported: 'Sun Wukong is here on business, seeking audience.'
輪日的諸天 is 'the deva whose turn of duty it was' (那 nà) — even Heaven works a rota. He goes to the mouth of the 潮音洞, the Tide-Sound Cave, where Guanyin lives, and announces the visitor: 朝見, 'here on business, seeking audience' (朝 cháo). The protocol is observed at every step.
The Bodhisattva was just then with the pearl-bearing Dragon Maiden by the Precious Lotus Pool, leaning on the rail to look at the flowers; hearing the report, she turned from the cloud-cliff,
捧珠龍女, the pearl-bearing Dragon Maiden, is Guanyin's attendant; 寶蓮池, the Precious Lotus Pool, and 雲巖, the cloud-cliff, sketch the rest. She is leaning on a rail looking at flowers. The contrast with the boiling river is the whole point of the image.
opened her door, and called him in. The Great Sage, grave and reverent, made his obeisance and did homage.
端肅皈依參拜: gravely, formally, he took refuge and made his obeisance. This is the creature who fought the massed armies of Heaven, wrecked the peach banquet and wrote his own name on a pillar he took for the end of the universe. Before Guanyin he behaves perfectly. It is the surest measure the novel has of where she stands.
The scene cuts from the churning river to the stillness of Potalaka, and the change of register is itself the meaning. The somersault cloud, whose speed the pilgrims argued over for a whole passage, carries the monkey to Guanyin's island in under half a double-hour — and then the narrative slows right down to observe the decorum of a sacred court: the deva-guardians of the twenty-four quarters, the duty-deva's formal announcement at the Tide-Sound Cave, the Bodhisattva at leisure by her lotus pool.
Two touches prepare the resolution. The monkey, who defies Heaven as a matter of policy, here makes his obeisance 端肅, 'grave and decorous' — Guanyin commands a respect he grants almost nobody. And the tranquil garden his crisis breaks into is the place from which the whole pilgrimage was set going. The reader begins to suspect that its mistress has foreseen this exact impasse, and that the demon of the Flowing Sands is not an accident of the road at all.