妖邪披掛 The Fiend in His Armour
你看那豬八戒行兇，闖至門前，厲聲高叫：「潑怪物！送我師父出來。」慌得那門裡小妖急報：「大王，門外有人要師父哩。」妖邪道：「這定是那潑和尚來了。」教：「快取披掛兵器來。」眾小妖連忙取出。妖邪結束了，執兵器在手，即命開門，走將出來。八戒與沙僧對列左右，見妖邪怎生披掛？好怪物，你看他：你看那猪八戒行凶，闯至门前，厉声高叫：「泼怪物！送我师父出来。」慌得那门里小妖急报：「大王，门外有人要师父哩。」妖邪道：「这定是那泼和尚来了。」教：「快取披挂兵器来。」众小妖连忙取出。妖邪结束了，执兵器在手，即命开门，走将出来。八戒与沙僧对列左右，见妖邪怎生披挂？好怪物，你看他：
逐句解 Line by line
Now see how Eight Rules played the ruffian: he charged up to the gate and shouted in a harsh voice, "Foul monster!
你看那, "now look at that" — the storyteller turning his audience toward the action, a leftover from when this material was performed aloud. 行兇: 行 xíng, "to act, to carry out."
Send my master out!"
Six characters and no argument in them. Bajie opens every negotiation of this kind as a demand rather than a question.
The little demons within the gate were so alarmed that they ran to report: "Great King, there is someone outside asking for a master."
慌得: 得 is the toneless de, "so alarmed that…" The 哩 at the end is the same everyday tag the pilgrims use, li — the underling reports to his king in exactly the register of the men outside the gate.
The fiend said: "This will surely be that rascally monk come back again."
妖邪 is this chapter's usual word for the demon, alternating with 妖怪 and 怪物. 那潑和尚 points: 那 nà.
He ordered: "Bring my armour and my weapon, and be quick."
教 is jiào, "to order, to have something done" — not jiāo, "to teach." 披掛, armour, comes straight from the verbs for draping and hanging things on a body.
The little demons hurried to fetch them out.
One line of stage business between the order and the arming. The demon's household has the smooth efficiency of a real court, and the narrative keeps giving it that.
The fiend girded himself, took his weapon in hand, gave the order to open the gate, and came striding out.
結束 has its older sense here — to gird oneself, to get kitted out — which is a long way from the modern "to finish," and one of the traps classical Chinese sets for readers who know only the modern word. 走將出來: 將 jiāng, marking direction.
Eight Rules and Sha Monk drew up to left and right. And how was the fiend accoutred?
怎生 is spoken Chinese for "in what manner." The rhetorical question is the fixed frame that opens a descriptive poem: the narrator asks, and the verse answers.
A fine monster — look at him:
你看他 followed by a colon is the cue proper. Eight couplets follow, and prose and poem belong to the same passage.
A golden helm on his head, flashing bright; / golden mail on his body, trailing a rainbow.
掣虹霓, "drawing out a rainbow" — the mail throws coloured light as he moves. This kind of arming-description is a courtesy the novel pays to enemies it intends the reader to take seriously.
About his waist a jewelled belt clustered with pearl and kingfisher; / on his feet smoke-yellow boots of curious make.
團珠翠: 團 means gathered into a round, so the belt is clustered rather than strung. 珠翠, pearls and kingfisher-feather work, is the standard pairing for expensive ornament.
The bridge of his nose high-arched as a peak upthrust; / his brow broad as a dragon's bearing.
鼻準 and 天庭 are terms from face-reading — the bridge of the nose and the upper forehead. So the portrait is also a reading of his fortune, and what it reads is noble birth.
His eyes glitter and flash, round and fierce besides; / his teeth are edges of steel, pointed and even.
圓還暴: 還 is hái, "and what's more." This is where the face-reading turns on itself. The noble brow sits above a predator's eyes and a predator's teeth.
Short hair, tangled and loose, streams out like flame; / a long beard, free and unbound, juts like awls of gold.
長鬚: 長 cháng, a measurement. 髮 fà. 瀟灑 today means stylish and free; of a beard it means unconstrained, sticking out every which way.
In his mouth he bites a sprig of green tender waterweed; / in his hand he grips a nine-petalled mallet of red copper.
青嫩藻 — a sprig of soft green pondweed, clenched in his teeth. Nine couplets of gold and jewels, and this single detail lets the river show through the court dress. The mallet in his other hand gets a whole poem to itself two passages on.
One creaking cry, and where the gate swings wide / the sound is the thunder of Waking Insects in the third month of spring.
驚蟄, Waking of Insects, is one of the twenty-four points of the Chinese solar year, at the start of March, when the first thunder is held to wake hibernating creatures out of the ground. It is a well-chosen comparison for a thing coming up out of the water. 門開處: 處 chù. 似 sì.
Such a figure is rare in the world of men: / well may he claim the style and majesty of a Numinous King.
The poem calls him 靈顯, roughly "his power shows," where the prose of the chapter calls him 靈感大王, the Great King whose power answers when you pray to him. The two titles are built alike but they are not the same words, and the 世德堂本 spelling is kept in each place rather than levelled to one. 稱 chēng.
The arming and the display are a fixed form, and the novel uses the form as a measure of respect. A nuisance demon gets dispatched in a line. An antagonist worth two chapters is dressed, armed, brought out through his own gate, and given eight couplets of portrait. Everything in this one is royal — golden helm, golden mail, jewelled belt, boots of unusual make — and the single jarring detail, the sprig of 青嫩藻 gripped in his teeth, is the river showing through the court clothes.
The method of the description is face-reading. 鼻準, the bridge of the nose, and 天庭, the upper forehead, are technical terms from the Chinese art of reading fortune in a face, where a high nose and a broad brow mean nobility. The verse grants him both — and then, in the very next couplet, turns the reading against him with eyes that flash and teeth like steel.
The closing couplet gives him his style, and in a form worth noticing. The poem names him 靈顯 where the surrounding prose names him 靈感大王. Both mean roughly that his power makes itself felt, but they are not the same two characters, and the edition's own wording is kept in both places instead of being tidied into agreement.