群猴授兵 Arming the Monkeys
卻說那花果山大小猴兒，正在那洞門外頑耍，忽聽得風聲響處，見半空中丫丫叉叉，無邊無岸的猴精，諕得都亂跑亂躲。少時，美猴王按落雲頭，收了雲霧，將身一抖，收了毫毛，將兵器都亂堆在山前，叫道：「小的們，都來領兵器。」眾猴看時，只見悟空獨立在平陽之地，俱跑來叩頭問故。悟空將前使狂風、搬兵器，一應事說了一遍。眾猴稱謝畢，都去搶刀奪劍，撾斧爭槍，扯弓扳弩，吆吆喝喝，耍了一日。却说那花果山大小猴儿，正在那洞门外顽耍，忽听得风声响处，见半空中丫丫叉叉，无边无岸的猴精，諕得都乱跑乱躲。少时，美猴王按落云头，收了云雾，将身一抖，收了毫毛，将兵器都乱堆在山前，叫道：「小的们，都来领兵器。」众猴看时，只见悟空独立在平阳之地，俱跑来叩头问故。悟空将前使狂风、搬兵器，一应事说了一遍。众猴称谢毕，都去抢刀夺剑，挝斧争枪，扯弓扳弩，吆吆喝喝，耍了一日。
逐句解 Line by line
Now the monkeys of the Mountain of Flowers and Fruit, big and small, were playing outside their cave-mouth when suddenly they heard the wind come roaring, and saw, filling the mid-air in forking, branching shapes, a boundless, shoreless host of monkey-sprites — and they took fright and bolted, scattering and hiding every which way.
猴兒 — 兒 is the er-suffix (兒化), neutral tone. 聽得 — 得 here is the resultative complement de ("managed to hear / heard"). 響處 takes 處 chù ("where it sounded"). 丫丫叉叉 is a descriptive reduplication — "forking, branching, every-which-way" — for the swarming shapes overhead. 諕 is a vernacular variant of 嚇 ("to frighten"), read xià; 諕得 = "so frightened that…" The graph recurs throughout the chapter.
Presently the Handsome Monkey King brought his cloud down, gathered in the mist, gave his body a shake, took back his hairs, and piled all the weapons in a heap before the mountain, calling out: 'Little ones, come and draw your arms!'
少時 — "presently, after a short while"; 少 reads shǎo ("little"), not shào. 按落 — "pressed down," 落 luò. 將 here is the object-marking preposition jiāng (= 把): 將身一抖 / 將兵器…堆. 一抖 takes yì (sandhi before third-tone 抖). 小的們 — "you little ones," an affectionate address; 的 de, plural 們 men.
When the monkeys looked, they saw only Wukong standing alone on the open ground, and they all came running to kowtow and ask what had happened.
平陽之地 — "level, open, sunlit ground." 叩頭 (kòu tóu) = to kowtow. 問故 = "asked the reason." That the multitude resolves back into a single figure quietly underscores that the looting "host" had been Wukong all along.
Wukong told them the whole business — how he had raised the gale and carried off the weapons — from start to finish.
將前使狂風 — 將 again the preposition jiāng ("as for / taking the matter of"). 一應事 — "all the matters, the whole business"; 一應 (yí yìng) is a set phrase "the entire lot," 應 reading yìng (fourth tone), with 一 taking yí before it. 一遍 takes yí (before fourth-tone 遍).
The monkeys finished their thanks and then fell to snatching sabers and seizing swords, grabbing axes and fighting over spears, pulling bows and drawing crossbows, hollering and whooping, and sported the whole day long.
稱謝 — "to voice thanks," 稱 chēng. The verbs run in vigorous parallel pairs (搶刀奪劍 / 撾斧爭槍 / 扯弓扳弩): 撾 zhuā ("snatch, strike"), 扳 bān ("to pull, draw"). 吆喝 (yāo-he) "to holler"; in the reduplicated 吆吆喝喝 the 喝 keeps its full hē. 一日 takes yí.
A brief, vivid comic-domestic interlude: the troop that will shortly be an army is, for the moment, a crowd of monkeys bolting at the noise of their own king's return. The narrative's delight in catalogue and motion — the forking shapes overhead, the heaped plunder, the scramble of snatching and hollering — is characteristic of the early chapters' high spirits. Andrew Plaks notes how the novel sustains this register of "play" (耍) right up to the threshold of real consequence; the monkeys' day-long romp with their new weapons (耍了一日) is holiday, not yet war.
The image of Wukong "standing alone on the open ground" (獨立在平陽之地) once cloud and clones are gathered back in quietly discloses what the spectacle had concealed: the looting multitude was all himself. The hair-clone host that stripped Aolai dissolves into a single body, and the borrowed grandeur with it — a small structural rhyme with the chapter's larger pattern, in which every accession of power (weapons, armor, rank, even deathlessness) is something Wukong seizes or takes rather than is granted. The distribution of arms to his "little ones" makes him, for the first time, not merely a king of revels but the captain of a force.