upon Sergey Ivanovitch, as though to ask: What’s one to say
to him? But Sergey Ivanovitch, who had been talking with
far less heat and one-sidedness than the professor, and who
had sufficient breadth of mind to answer the professor, and at
the same time to comprehend the simple and natural point of
view from which the question was put, smiled and said:
‘That question we have no right to answer as yet.’
‘We have not the requisite data,’ chimed in the professor, and he went back to his argument. ‘No,’ he said; ‘I would
point out the fact that if, as Pripasov directly asserts, perception is based on sensation, then we are bound to distinguish
sharply between these two conceptions.’
Levin listened no more, and simply waited for the professor to go.
45
Chapter 8
When the professor had gone, Sergey Ivanovitch turned
to his brother.
‘Delighted that you’ve come. For some time, is it? How’s
your farming getting on?’
Levin knew that his elder brother took little interest in
farming, and only put the question in deference to him, and
so he only told him about the sale of his wheat and money
matters.
Levin had meant to tell his brother of his determination
to get married, and to ask his advice; he had indeed firmly resolved to do so. But after seeing his brother, listening
to his conversation with the professor, hearing afterwards
the unconsciously patronizing tone in which his brother
questioned him about agricultural matters (their mother’s
property had not been divided, and Levin took charge of
both their shares), Levin felt that he could not for some reason begin to talk to him of his intention of marrying. He
felt that his brother would not look at it as he would have
wished him to.
‘Well, how is your district council doing?’ asked Sergey
Ivanovitch, who was greatly interested in these local boards
and attached great importance to them.
‘I really don’t know.’
‘What! Why, surely you’re a member of the board?’
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Anna Karenina
‘No, I’m not a member now; I’ve resigned,’ answered
Levin, ‘and I no longer attend the meetings.’
‘What a pity!’ commented Sergey Ivanovitch, frowning.
Levin in self-defense began to describe what took place
in the meetings in his district.
‘That’s how it always is!’ Sergey Ivanovitch interrupted him. ‘We Russians are always like that. Perhaps it’s our
strong point, really, the faculty of seeing our own shortcomings; but we overdo it, we comfort ourselves with irony
which we always have on the tip of our tongues. All I say is,
give such rights as our local self-government to any other
European people—why, the Germans or the English would
have worked their way to freedom from them, while we simply turn them into ridicule.’
‘But how can it be helped?’ said Levin penitently. ‘It was
my last effort. And I did try with all my soul. I can’t. I’m no
good at it.’
‘It’s not that you’re no good at it,’ said Sergey Ivanovitch;
‘it is that you don’t look at it as you should.’
‘Perhaps not,’ Levin answered dejectedly.
‘Oh! do you know brother Nikolay’s turned up again?’
This brother Nikolay was the elder brother of Konstantin
Levin, and half-brother of Sergey Ivanovitch; a man utterly
ruined, who had dissipated the greater part of his fortune,
was living in the strangest and lowest company, and had
quarreled with his brothers.
‘What did you say?’ Levin cried with horror. ‘How do
you know?’
‘Prokofy saw him in the street.’
47
‘Here in Moscow? Where is he? Do you know?’ Levin got
up from his chair, as though on the point of starting off at
once.
‘I am sorry I told you,’ said Sergey Ivanovitch, shaking his head at his younger brother’s excitement. ‘I sent to
find out where he is living, and sent him his IOU to Trubin,
which I paid. This is the answer he sent me.’
And Sergey Ivanovitch took a note from under a paperweight and handed it to his brother.
Levin read in the queer, familiar handwriting: ‘I humbly
beg you to leave me in peace. That’s the only favor I ask of
my gracious brothers.—Nikolay Levin.’
Levin read it, and without raising his head stood with
the note in his hands opposite Sergey Ivanovitch.
There was a struggle in his heart between the desire to
forget his unhappy brother for the time, and the consciousness that it would be base to do so.
‘He obviously wants to offend me,’ pursued Sergey Ivanovitch; ‘but he cannot offend me, and I should have wished
with all my heart to assist him, but I know it’s impossible
to do that.’
‘Yes, yes,’ repeated Levin. ‘I understand and appreciate
your attitude to him; but I shall go and see him.’
‘If you want to, do; but I shouldn’t advise it,’ said Sergey
Ivanovitch. ‘As regards myself, I have no fear of your doing
so; he will not make you quarrel with me; but for your own
sake, I should say you would do better not to go. You can’t
do him any good; still, do as you please.’
‘Very likely I can’t do any good, but I feel—especially at
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Anna Karenina
such a moment—but that’s another thing—I feel I could not
be at peace.’
‘Well, that I don’t understand,’ said Sergey Ivanovitch.
‘One thing I do understand,’ he added; ‘it’s a lesson in
humility. I have come to look very differently and more
charitably on what is called infamous since brother Nikolay
has become what he is…you know what he did…’
‘Oh, it’s awful, awful!’ repeated Levin.
After obtaining his brother’s address from Sergey Ivanovitch’s footman, Levin was on the point of setting off at
once to see him, but on second thought he decided to put off
his visit till the evening. The first thing to do to set his heart
at rest was to accomplish what he had come to Moscow for.
From his brother’s Levin went to Oblonsky’s office, and on
getting news of the Shtcherbatskys from him, he drove to
the place where he had been told he might find Kitty.
49
Chapter 9
At four o’clock, conscious of his throbbing heart, Levin
stepped out of a hired sledge at the Zoological Gardens, and
turned along the path to the frozen mounds and the skating
ground, knowing that he would certainly find her there, as
he had seen the Shtcherbatskys’ carriage at the entrance.
It was a bright, frosty day. Rows of carriages, sledges, drivers, and policemen were standing in the approach.
Crowds of well-dressed people, with hats bright in the sun,
swarmed about the entrance and along the well-swept little
paths between the little houses adorned with carving in the
Russian style. The old curly birches of the gardens, all their
twigs laden with snow, looked as though freshly decked in
sacred vestments.
He walked along the path towards the skating-ground,
and kept saying to himself—‘You mustn’t be excited, you
must be calm. What’s the matter with you? What do you
want? Be quiet, stupid,’ he conjured his heart. And the more
he tried to compose himself, the more breathless he found
himself. An acquaintance met him and called him by his
name, but Levin did not even recognize him. He went towards the mounds, whence came the clank of the chains of
sledges as they slipped down or were dragged up, the rumble of the sliding sledges, and the sounds of merry voices.
He walked on a few steps, and the skating-ground lay open
50
Anna Karenina
before his eyes, and at once, amidst all the skaters, he knew
her.
He knew she was there by the rapture and the terror that
seized on his heart. She was standing talking to a lady at the
opposite end of the ground. There was apparently nothing
striking either in her dress or her attitude. But for Levin she
was as easy to find in that crowd as a rose among nettles.
Everything was made bright by her. She was the smile that
shed light on all round her. ‘Is it possible I can go over there
on the ice, go up to her?’ he thought. The place where she
stood seemed to him a holy shrine, unapproachable, and
there was one moment when he was almost retreating, so
overwhelmed was he with terror. He had to make an effort
to master himself, and to remind himself that people of all
sorts were moving about her, and that he too might come
there to skate. He walked down, for a long while avoiding
looking at her as at the sun, but seeing her, as one does the
sun, without looking.
On that day of the week and at that time of day people
of one set, all acquainted with one another, used to meet
on the ice. There were crack skaters there, showing off their
skill, and learners clinging to chairs with timid, awkward
movements, boys, and elderly people skating with hygienic motives. They seemed to Levin an elect band of blissful
beings because they were here, near her. All the skaters, it
seemed, with perfect self-possession, skated towards her,
skated by her, even spoke to her, and were happy, quite apart
from her, enjoying the capital ice and the fine weather.
Nikolay Shtcherbatsky, Kitty’s cousin, in a short jack
51
et and tight trousers, was sitting on a garden seat with his
skates on. Seeing Levin, he shouted to him:
‘Ah, the first skater in Russia! Been here long? First-rate
ice—do put your skates on.’
‘I haven’t got my skates,’ Levin answered, marveling
at this boldness and ease in her presence, and not for one
second losing sight of her, though he did not look at her.
He felt as though the sun were coming near him. She was
in a corner, and turning out her slender feet in their high
boots with obvious timidity, she skated towards him. A boy
in Russian dress, desperately waving his arms and bowed
down to the ground, overtook her. She skated a little uncertainly; taking her hands out of the little muff that hung on
a cord, she held them ready for emergency, and looking towards Levin, whom she had recognized, she smiled at him,
and at her own fears. When she had got round the turn, she
gave herself a push off with one foot, and skated straight up
to Shtcherbatsky. Clutching at his arm, she nodded smiling
to Levin. She was more splendid than he had imagined her.
When he thought of her, he could call up a vivid picture
of her
