沒齒不忘 Never Forgotten While I Live
那娘娘聽說，沉吟不語。行者取出寶串，雙手奉上道：「你若不信，看此物何來？」娘娘一見垂淚，下座拜謝道：「長老，你果是救得我回朝，沒齒不忘大恩。」那娘娘听说，沉吟不语。行者取出宝串，双手奉上道：「你若不信，看此物何来？」娘娘一见垂泪，下座拜谢道：「长老，你果是救得我回朝，没齿不忘大恩。」
逐句解 Line by line
The queen heard him out and pondered without a word.
沉吟不語 is turning a thing over in silence. Nine characters answer a hundred and sixty-nine, and they answer with nothing at all — she neither believes him nor accuses him.
Pilgrim brought out the bracelets and presented them in both hands: "If you do not believe me, look at this. Where else would it have come from?"
雙手奉上 is the formal presentation in both hands, and it restores exactly the ceremony his greeting withheld. The question at the end is not rhetorical: he is asking her to reason from the object, which is the whole reason he spent a passage acquiring it.
At one sight of them the queen's tears came down. She came down from her seat and bowed her thanks: "Elder, if you can truly save me and bring me back to court, I shall not forget so great a kindness while I have teeth in my head."
沒 is mò here, to be used up or come to an end. The 1716 dictionary files the character under a single reading, glosses it as sinking and as being exhausted, and cites the 詩經 for it; 沒齒 is until the teeth are gone — to the end of a life. The everyday méi that this chapter has used seven times for there-is-no does not appear on that page at all. 得 is the light de, tying 救 to what the saving achieves.
A hundred and sixty-nine characters of true testimony get silence; a pair of bracelets gets tears. She does not weigh the evidence — she recognises her own jewellery, and that settles in a single glance what the speech could not settle at all. This is precisely why he asked the king for something she was fond of rather than for proof of anything.
What she does next is get down off the seat. The chapter placed her in the middle of a false court with fox-women ranked either side, and her first act on being told there is a way home is to leave the chair. Nobody has to explain to her what the position was worth.
Her promise is conditional and she says so — if you can truly bring me back. It is the first time in the chapter that anybody has offered Wukong thanks with a condition attached to them, and it comes from the only person in it who has nothing to give him.