原文 Original text
繁體 Traditional
Reader's edition
七八回合
Seven Or Eight Passes
二怪即出營，見了八戒，更不打話，挺槍劈面刺來；這獃子舉鈀上前迎住。他兩個在山坡前搭上手，鬥不上七八回合，獃子手軟，架不得妖魔，急回頭叫：「師兄，不好了，扯扯救命索，扯扯救命索。」二怪即出营，见了八戒，更不打话，挺枪劈面刺来；这呆子举钯上前迎住。他两个在山坡前搭上手，斗不上七八回合，呆子手软，架不得妖魔，急回头叫：「师兄，不好了，扯扯救命索，扯扯救命索。」
逐句解 Line by line
二怪即出營，見了八戒，更不打話，挺槍劈面刺來；
二怪即出营，见了八戒，更不打话，挺枪劈面刺来；
The second fiend came straight out of camp, saw Bajie, and without a word of parley levelled his spear and thrust at his face.
更 reads gèng — not even so much as a word.
這獃子舉鈀上前迎住。
这呆子举钯上前迎住。
The fool raised his rake and went forward to meet him.
迎住 — to meet and hold, rather than merely to meet.
他兩個在山坡前搭上手，鬥不上七八回合，獃子手軟，架不得妖魔，急回頭叫：「師兄，不好了，扯扯救命索，扯扯救命索。」
他两个在山坡前搭上手，斗不上七八回合，呆子手软，架不得妖魔，急回头叫：「师兄，不好了，扯扯救命索，扯扯救命索。」
The two of them closed in front of the slope. Before seven or eight passes were done the fool's arms went weak, he could not hold the monster off, and he turned his head and cried: "Brother! It is going badly! Pull the lifeline! Pull the lifeline!"
得 is the light de in 架不得, a potential complement: he cannot manage to hold him off. 回合 counts exchanges of blows.
總評 Commentary
Seven or eight passes is the novel's standard measure for a fight that was never going to last. A real contest in this book runs to thirty, fifty, a hundred exchanges; seven or eight means one side was outmatched from the first blow. The number is doing the work of a whole paragraph.
The demon comes on without a word, which is worth marking after a chapter in which everyone has talked incessantly. No boast, no challenge, no negotiation — he simply levels the spear. Of the three brothers this is the competent one, and the novel shows it by giving him no dialogue at all.
Bajie's cry is doubled, and by now the reader knows what doubling means in this prose: it is the sound of a person losing composure. He asked for the lifeline nearly two hundred characters back, as a sensible precaution and in a laughing voice. He is not laughing now.