Then he called out in a loud, ringing voice: "Your Majesty, on the left hand the cùn pulse is forceful and taut, the guān pulse rough and slack, the chǐ pulse hollow and sunken;

The verdict is shouted through a window at a king who cannot see the man giving it. Six pulses, named in two sets of three, left hand first. 濇 (sè) is the older way of writing 澀 — a pulse that does not run smooth. 芤 (kōu) is named after the hollow stalk of a scallion, which is exactly what the pulse feels like: full at the edges, empty in the middle. 強 is qiáng, forceful.

on the right hand the cùn pulse is floating and slippery, the guān pulse slow and knotted, the chǐ pulse rapid and firm.

Now the right hand, in the same shape as the left. 數 here is shuò, and the dictionary is unusually helpful about why. 康熙 files this character under three separate readings: one for shǔ, to count, glossed 計也; one for shù, a number, glossed 算數也; and a third for shuò, glossed 頻數也 — frequent — with the 《爾雅》 line 數，疾也, "rapid", filed underneath it. A racing pulse is 數脈, and only the third will do.