稻草包蹄 Straw Bound About the Hooves
遂此相向而別，徑至河邊冰上，那馬蹄滑了一滑，險些兒把三藏跌下馬來。沙僧道：「師父，難行。」八戒道：「且住，問陳老官討個稻草來我用。」行者道：「要稻草何用？」八戒道：「你那裡得知？要稻草包著馬蹄方才不滑，免教跌下師父來也。」陳老在岸上聽言，急命人家中取一束稻草，卻請唐僧上岸下馬。八戒將草包裹馬足，然後踏冰而行。遂此相向而别，径至河边冰上，那马蹄滑了一滑，险些儿把三藏跌下马来。沙僧道：「师父，难行。」八戒道：「且住，问陈老官讨个稻草来我用。」行者道：「要稻草何用？」八戒道：「你那里得知？要稻草包着马蹄方才不滑，免教跌下师父来也。」陈老在岸上听言，急命人家中取一束稻草，却请唐僧上岸下马。八戒将草包裹马足，然后踏冰而行。
逐句解 Line by line
So they took leave of one another and went straight down to the ice at the riverside; but the horse's hooves gave a slip, and Tripitaka came within a little of being thrown.
相向而別: 相 is xiāng. 那馬蹄 is nà; 險些兒 ends in the light er. 滑了一滑 keeps 一 at yì before a rising tone. The very first step onto the ice nearly unseats him, and nobody reads it as a warning.
Sha Monk said: 「Master, it is hard going.」
難行: 難 is nán, 行 is xíng. Sha Monk's third and last objection, and the shortest of the three.
Eight Rules said: 「Wait a moment — ask old Master Chen for some rice-straw for my use.」
老官 is a familiar way of addressing an older man — "old fellow," roughly, and less formal than anything else the pilgrims have called him.
Pilgrim said: 「What do you want rice-straw for?」
The straight man's question. Wukong sets his brother up to explain.
Eight Rules said: 「How should you know?
那裡 is nǎ — "how would you know?" — a question expecting no answer, not a pointing word. 得知: 得 is dé.
We want rice-straw to wrap the horse's hooves, and then it will not slip, and the master will not be thrown down.」
包著: 著 is zhe, the reading for a state that goes on. 免教: 教 is jiào, letting something happen. The trick is real horsemanship — straw wrapped round a hoof gives grip on ice — and Eight Rules knows it because he has walked on ice before.
Old Chen heard him from the bank and quickly sent someone to fetch a bundle of rice-straw from the house, and asked the Tang Monk to come ashore and dismount.
家中: 中 is zhōng. 一束 lifts 一 to yí before a falling tone. And note that Old Chen has not gone home. He is still standing on the bank, watching them go.
Eight Rules took the straw and bound up the horse's feet, and then they trod the ice and went on.
將 is jiāng. 踏冰而行: 行 is xíng — and the phrase is the chapter title's 履層冰 put into plainer words.
Eight Rules is the practical intelligence of this whole sequence, and the novel is quite deliberate about it. He devised the test that proved the ice; here he sees the horse slip, understands at once what is wanted, and asks for rice-straw to bind the hooves — an expedient any Ming carter would recognise, and one neither of the other disciples thinks of.
The pattern is worth naming. Wukong's competence is magical and moral; Eight Rules' is bodily and worldly. On a frozen river the second is the more use, and for the space of two passages the Idiot is running the expedition while his elder brother asks him what the straw is for.
Old Chen is still on the bank. He has sent to his own house for straw and waits while it is fetched and tied on, and the last thing he does for these travellers is help them onto the ice he spent three speeches trying to keep them off.