Tripitaka turned quickly, and saw an old monk holding a bamboo staff, who came forward and made his greeting, saying, "Is this the master come from China?" Tripitaka returned the greeting and said, "I dare not claim it." The old monk praised him without stopping, and then asked, "What is the master's honoured age?"

不敢 — I dare not — is the standard deflection of a compliment, and means something like you are too kind rather than an actual denial.

高壽 — honoured age — is the polite way to ask how old someone is, and asking at all is a courtesy rather than an intrusion. The old monk asks it within four exchanges of meeting, which is fast, and he has a reason for wanting the number.

Tripitaka said, "I have idled away forty-five years. Might I ask the reverend abbot's honoured age?" The old monk laughed and said, "I am foolishly older than the master by one full cycle."

虛度 — idled away — is the modest formula for giving your own age. You do not say you have lived so many years; you say you have wasted them.

一花甲 is one full cycle of the Chinese calendar — sixty years. The system pairs ten stems with twelve branches, and the combinations run out and start again after sixty, so a cycle is both a length of time and the point at which the naming of years repeats. The old monk is a hundred and five.

痴長 — foolishly older — is the same modest move. He is not claiming seniority; he is apologising for it.

Pilgrim said, "This year that makes you a hundred and five. How many years would you say I have?" The old monk said, "The master's face is ancient and his spirit clear, and besides, on a moonlit night the eyes swim, and I cannot make it out at a glance." They talked a while, and then went to look at the back walk.

Pilgrim does the arithmetic instantly — forty-five and sixty — and then cannot resist. He has several centuries on the pair of them and has been waiting for an opening.

貌古神清 — the face ancient, the spirit clear — is high praise dressed as an evasion. The old monk has no idea and says so beautifully.

月夜眼花 — on a moonlit night the eyes swim. He blames the light. It is the politest possible way of declining to guess, and it is also true: the narrator set that half-moon two lines earlier, and the whole conversation is happening in it.

Tripitaka said, "You spoke just now of the foundations of the Garden of the Friendless. Where exactly are they?" The old monk said, "Just outside the back gate."

Tripitaka has been holding this question through the whole exchange about ages. He is a scholar in a library and cannot help himself.

The first character of 給孤園 is not the everyday one meaning give. In this name it is read jǐ, to supply — the Elder's title means he who provides for the friendless. The chapter uses it nine times and every one is part of this name.

The answer is four characters long and it moves the entire chapter outdoors.