原文 Original text
繁體 Traditional
Reader's edition
嘴搶地 Face Down In The Dirt
始初還跌個躘踵，後面就跌了個嘴搶地。被妖精趕上，捽開鼻子，就如蛟龍一般，把八戒一鼻子捲住，得勝回洞。眾妖凱歌齊唱，一擁而歸。始初还跌个躘踵，后面就跌了个嘴抢地。被妖精赶上，捽开鼻子，就如蛟龙一般，把八戒一鼻子卷住，得胜回洞。众妖凯歌齐唱，一拥而归。
逐句解 Line by line
始初還跌個躘踵，後面就跌了個嘴搶地。
始初还跌个躘踵，后面就跌了个嘴抢地。
The first fall was a stagger; the next put his snout in the ground.
搶 reads qiāng, to knock against. 康熙字典 gives 七羊切 for this band and cites the old phrase about striking the head on the earth. The qiǎng of snatching is a different band. 躘踵 is a stumbling, tottering gait.
被妖精趕上，捽開鼻子，就如蛟龍一般，把八戒一鼻子捲住，得勝回洞。
被妖精赶上，捽开鼻子，就如蛟龙一般，把八戒一鼻子卷住，得胜回洞。
The monster caught up with him, unfurled his trunk like a river dragon, wrapped it once round Bajie, and carried him back to the cave in triumph.
捽開 — to shake out, to unroll. 得 keeps dé in 得勝: attainment, not a complement.
眾妖凱歌齊唱，一擁而歸。
众妖凯歌齐唱，一拥而归。
The demons sang a victory song together and came home in a crowd.
凱歌 — the song sung on returning from a won battle.
The word for the second fall is a borrowed one, and it carries a memory. In the classical passage everyone would have known, a commoner's anger is described as beating the head on the ground — a gesture of helpless rage. Applied to a pig falling over his own rope, the grand old phrase becomes a pratfall.
The trunk is the reveal. Until this line the second fiend has been a figure with a spear; now he shakes out an elephant's trunk and picks up a full-grown man with it. Nothing earlier in this chapter has said what these three are, and the information arrives in the middle of an action rather than in a pause to explain.
The chapter's second movement ends as the first did, with the demons going home singing and the pilgrims worse off than before. Wukong began this scene arranging a joke at Bajie's expense. The joke has cost him a brother, and the novel does not say so, because it does not need to.