三個大丸子 Three Great Pills
三人回至廳上，把前項藥餌攪和一處，搓了三個大丸子。行者道：「兄弟，忒大了。」八戒道：「只有核桃大，若論我吃，還不夠一口哩。」遂此收在一個小盒兒裡，兄弟們連衣睡下。一夜無詞，早是天曉。三人回至厅上，把前项药饵搅和一处，搓了三个大丸子。行者道：「兄弟，忒大了。」八戒道：「只有核桃大，若论我吃，还不够一口哩。」遂此收在一个小盒儿里，兄弟们连衣睡下。一夜无词，早是天晓。
逐句解 Line by line
The three of them went back up to the hall, stirred the aforesaid drugs together into one mass, and rolled out three large pills.
Rhubarb, croton, soot and urine, stirred into one mass and rolled into three pills. 和 is huò here, to blend substances together. 康熙 files that sense under its own falling-tone reading, glossed 調也 and carrying the old citations about seasoning and boiling; the level reading is concord in the abstract, which is what the same character meant when Pilgrim said he would go along with Eight Rules.
Pilgrim said, "Brothers — those are too big."
忒 is the everyday intensifier — far too. Having compounded a medicine out of soot and horse urine, Pilgrim's one aesthetic objection is to the size of the pills.
Eight Rules said, "They are only the size of walnuts. Speaking for myself, that would not be a mouthful."
若論我吃 — if it is a question of my eating them. That is the second time in this chapter Eight Rules has measured something against his own appetite. 還 is hái.
So they put them away in a small box, and the brothers lay down to sleep in their clothes.
連衣睡下 — lying down still dressed — records how little of the night is left. 兒 is the light suffix.
Nothing more was said that night, and soon it was dawn.
The storyteller's formula for skipping an interval.
The compounding finishes in a single sentence. Rhubarb, croton, soot and horse urine, stirred into one mass and rolled into three pills — an entire pharmacy carried across a city, a whole night of argument, and this is the result.
The exchange that follows is the chapter in miniature. Pilgrim's one objection to a medicine made of soot and urine is that the pills are too big; Eight Rules replies that they are only walnut-sized and would not make him a mouthful. Neither of them says one word about what is in them.
Then the brothers lie down in their clothes and the storyteller closes the night in a line. The medicine is made, and the reader has watched every single ingredient go in — which is exactly where the chapter needs you before the court is told what it is taking.