Pilgrim then led Master out onto the high road.

Back on the road. 行者 keeps 行 as xíng; the 了 of 上了大路 marks the getting-there as done.

When they had travelled a good while, of a sudden a towering mountain barred the way. Tripiṭaka reined in his horse, stayed his whip, and said, "Disciples, a mountain lies ahead — we must go warily, lest demons work mischief and do our company harm."

Tripiṭaka sees a mountain and immediately assumes the worst, which after twenty-three chapters is a reasonable habit. 行夠多時, xíng gòu duō shí — having travelled a good long while. 仔細, zǐ xì, here means "be on your guard" rather than "be detailed." 作耗, zuò hào, to make trouble.

Pilgrim said with a laugh, "Before your horse stand we three — what demons need you fear?"

Pilgrim's answer is pure swagger: there are three of us in front of your horse. 甚 is shèn, "what."

At this the Elder set his heart at ease and pressed forward.

長老, zhǎng lǎo, the Elder — 長 in its "senior" reading. Hold onto that, because a few lines into the abbey the same character will show up meaning "long-lived" and take a different tone.

And that mountain — it was a fine mountain indeed:

This is the cue. When a Ming novel says 真是好山 and then stops, a set-piece is coming: no speaker, no dialogue, just the landscape rendered as a 賦 or rhapsody — a long, unrhymed set-piece built out of matched pairs of lines. The next nineteen lines are that rhapsody.

A soaring peak, sublime; a mighty mass, sheer-ridged.

峻極, jùn jí, high to the utmost; 崢嶸, zhēng róng, jagged and towering. The rhapsody opens with two four-syllable blocks, the plainest possible metre, before it starts elaborating.

Its roots joined the veins of Kunlun; its crown brushed the heart of the Milky Way.

崑崙, Kūn lún, is the world-axis mountain of Chinese myth, where the Queen Mother of the West keeps her court. Saying a range's roots join Kunlun's veins is the geological equivalent of claiming royal descent. 霄漢中, xiāo hàn zhōng, up amid the Milky Way.

White cranes came ever to roost in its cypress and juniper; dark gibbons swung the season round from its trailing vines.

玄猿, xuán yuán, the dark gibbon; 藤蘿, téng luó, wisteria and trailing creeper. Cranes above, apes below — the standard vertical furniture of a holy mountain.

Sunlight lit the clear-standing wood — layer on layer, a thousand strands of red mist wound about;

疊疊, dié dié, fold upon fold. This line and the next are a matched pair: sun and mist here, wind and cloud there, each built to the same measure.

wind rose from the shadowed ravine — fluttering, ten thousand streams of coloured cloud took flight.

陰壑, yīn hè, the ravine the sun never reaches; 飄飄, piāo piāo, drifting on the air. Note how the pair works — sunlit wood against shadowed gorge, red mist against coloured cloud, wound about against took flight.

Secret birds cried in confusion within the green bamboo; brocade pheasants vied together among the wild blossoms.

錦雞, jǐn jī, the golden pheasant, a spectacularly coloured bird. 齊鬥, qí dòu, contending all together, with 鬥 as dòu, to vie.

There one saw the Thousand-Year Peak, the Five-Blessings Peak, the Lotus Peak, towering stern and cold, casting a fine radiance;

Three peaks by name, and the next line answers with three stones by name — the rhapsody's favourite trick, a list balanced against a list. 巍巍凜凜, wēi wēi lǐn lǐn, towering and severe.

the Myriad-Ages Stone, the Tiger-Fang Stone, the Three-Heavens Stone, jutting sharp and glittering, breathing an auspicious vapour.

And there are the three stones, answering the three peaks. 突突磷磷, tū tū lín lín, jutting and glittering; 瑞氣, ruì qì, the auspicious vapour a holy site is supposed to breathe out.

Before the cliffs, fine grasses; on the ridges, fragrant plum.

A tight four-and-four after the long lines — the rhapsody varying its pace. 崖, yá, cliff.

Bramble and thorn, dense and thick; iris and orchid, pure and pale.

芝蘭, zhī lán, iris and orchid, which in Chinese poetry always carry a second meaning: they are the emblems of a cultivated character, and a scholar's good influence is said to be like walking into a room where they grow. Setting them against brambles is not just scenery. 淡淡, dàn dàn, faint, delicate.

In the deep wood, hawks and phoenixes gathered a thousand fowl; in ancient grottoes, the qilin ruled ten thousand beasts.

麒麟, qí lín, the qilin — the auspicious beast that appears only when a sage is abroad in the world. 轄, xiá, to hold sway over. Birds ruled by phoenixes, beasts ruled by qilin: the mountain has a functioning government.

The ravine waters ran with feeling — winding, curling, coiling back many times to look again;

The verse gives the stream feelings. 遶顧, rào gù, to wind round and look back — as though the water keeps turning for another glance. The ridges in the next line answer it, doubling back in the same way.

the ranged peaks, unbroken — fold on fold, tier on tier, turning back upon themselves.

重重疊疊, chóng chóng dié dié, layer on layer, with 重 as chóng, "repeated," not zhòng, "heavy." 週迴, zhōu huí, to circle back around.

Again one saw the green locust, the mottled bamboo, the blue-black pine, clinging on through a thousand years, vying in lush splendour;

Three evergreens, and the next line answers with three flowering trees — the same list-against-list architecture as the peaks and stones. 穠華, nóng huá, thick luxuriant bloom.

the white plum, the red peach, the kingfisher willow, glowing bright, contending in the beauty of the three spring months.

三春, sān chūn, the three months of spring. 翠的柳, the kingfisher-green willow. Set beside the previous line, the contrast is longevity against brilliance: a thousand years of clinging on, three months of blazing.

Dragons intoned and tigers roared; cranes danced and gibbons cried.

Two pairs of matched sounds — dragon and tiger, crane and gibbon — each a stock item of the holy-mountain inventory. Eight syllables, four creatures, no verbs to spare.

River-deer came forth from the flowers; the blue simurgh sang to the sun.

麋鹿, mí lù, the river-deer or Père David's deer; 青鸞, qīng luán, the blue simurgh, a bird of the phoenix family.

This was a true blessed ground of the immortals' hills — Penglai and Langyuan were but such as this.

The rhapsody makes its claim: this is not just a nice mountain but a 福地, a blessed ground. 蓬萊閬苑, Péng lái Làng yuàn, are the island-paradise and the hanging garden of the immortals — and the line says they are merely like this one. Nobody in the story has said a word yet; the verse has told the reader where they are before the characters find out.

And one saw, too, the flowering and fading that crown the hilltops, the clouds that come and go along the ridges.

A closing couplet — a matched pair of lines — on impermanence — flowers opening and falling, clouds coming and going — which lets the rhapsody land softly instead of on a superlative.