Canonical Classics ← 第八十五回
第八十五回
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The Mind-Ape Envies the Wood Mother · The Fiend Lord Plots to Swallow the Chan

有些兒先兆
模式 Mode Read Study
拼音 Pinyin Off
字體 Script
原文 Original text 繁體 Traditional Reader's edition

有些兒先兆 My Master Had Some Warning

yòujiànzuǒyòushǒuxiàyǒusānshíxiǎoyāobǎilièzàidepēnfēngǎixíngzhěànxiàodào:「shīyǒuxiēérxiānzhàoshuōshìtiānfēngguǒránfēngshìyāojīngzàizhènòngxuānérliyòujiànzuǒyòushǒuxiàyǒusānshíxiǎoyāobǎilièzàidepēnfēngǎixíngzhěànxiàodào:「shīyǒuxiēérxiānzhàoshuōshìtiānfēngguǒránfēngshìyāojīngzàizhènòngxuānérli


逐句解 Line by line

yòujiànzuǒyòushǒuxiàyǒusānshíxiǎoyāobǎilièzàidepēnfēngǎi yòujiànzuǒyòushǒuxiàyǒusānshíxiǎoyāobǎilièzàidepēnfēngǎi

He saw too that thirty or forty little imps were drawn up to left and right of him, while he sat there working away at blowing wind and belching fog.

is ǎi again, and the pair of verbs is the same pair the portrait used, now in prose and in the other order. 逼法的 is a rare adverbial — pushing at it, forcing the working — so the fiend is not merely exhaling weather but labouring at it.

xíngzhěànxiàodào:「shīyǒuxiēérxiānzhàoshuōshìtiānfēngguǒránfēngshìyāojīngzàizhènòngxuānérli xíngzhěànxiàodào:「shīyǒuxiēérxiānzhàoshuōshìtiānfēngguǒránfēngshìyāojīngzàizhènòngxuānérli

Pilgrim laughed to himself. "My master did have some foreknowledge after all. He said it was no wind of heaven, and sure enough this wind is a fiend up here making a racket.

He concedes it privately and never says a word of it aloud. 先兆 is a foretoken, a sense of something before it arrives — he is granting his master a faculty, not a lucky guess. 弄喧兒 is vernacular for kicking up a fuss or putting on a show.


總評 Commentary

The admission is the hinge of the chapter and it happens inside Pilgrim's head. He knows his master was right. He knows he talked him out of it. He is about to go down and lie about it anyway.

Thirty or forty imps drawn up in ranks is not the description of a lone monster. The novel has shown Pilgrim an organised force, and he will report clear weather.