Anna kareninna by leon tolstoy

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net Title: Anna Karenina Author: Leo Tolstoy Translator: Constance Garnett Release Date: April 2, 2005 [EBook #1399] [Last updated: December 9, 2011] Language: English *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANNA KARENINA *** Etext prepared by David Brannan Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy Translated by Constance Garnett Part One Chapter Happy families are all alike; every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way Everything was in confusion in the Oblonskys' house The wife had discovered that the husband was carrying on an intrigue with a French girl, who had been a governess in their family, and she had announced to her husband that she could not go on living in the same house with him This position of affairs had now lasted three days, and not only the husband and wife themselves, but all the members of their family and household, were painfully conscious of it Every person in the house felt that there was no sense in their living together, and that the stray people brought together by chance in any inn had more in common with one another than they, the members of the family and household of the Oblonskys The wife did not leave her own room, the husband had not been at home for three days The children ran wild all over the house; the English governess quarreled with the housekeeper, and wrote to a friend asking her to look out for a new situation for her; the man-cook had walked off the day before just at dinner time; the kitchen-maid, and the coachman had given warning Three days after the quarrel, Prince Stepan Arkadyevitch Oblonsky—Stiva, as he was called in the fashionable world— woke up at his usual hour, that is, at eight o'clock in the morning, not in his wife's bedroom, but on the leather-covered sofa in his study He turned over his stout, well-cared-for person on the springy sofa, as though he would sink into a long sleep again; he vigorously embraced the pillow on the other side and buried his face in it; but all at once he jumped up, sat up on the sofa, and opened his eyes "Yes, yes, how was it now?" he thought, going over his dream "Now, how was it? To be sure! Alabin was giving a dinner at Darmstadt; no, not Darmstadt, but something American Yes, but then, Darmstadt was in America Yes, Alabin was giving a dinner on glass tables, and the tables sang, Il mio tesoro—not Il mio tesoro though, but something better, and there were some sort of little decanters on the table, and they were women, too," he remembered Stepan Arkadyevitch's eyes twinkled gaily, and he pondered with a smile "Yes, it was nice, very nice There was a great deal more that was delightful, only there's no putting it into words, or even expressing it in one's thoughts awake." And noticing a gleam of light peeping in beside one of the serge curtains, he cheerfully dropped his feet over the edge of the sofa, and felt about with them for his slippers, a present on his last birthday, worked for him by his wife on gold-colored morocco And, as he had done every day for the last nine years, he stretched out his hand, without getting up, towards the place where his dressing-gown always in his bedroom And thereupon he suddenly remembered that he was not sleeping in his wife's room, but in his study, and why: the smile vanished from his face, he knitted his brows "Ah, ah, ah! Oo!…" he muttered, recalling everything that had happened And again every detail of his quarrel with his wife was present to his imagination, all the hopelessness of his position, and worst of all, his own fault "Yes, she won't forgive me, and she can't forgive me And the most awful thing about it is that it's all my fault—all my fault, though I'm not to blame That's the point of the whole situation," he reflected "Oh, oh, oh!" he kept repeating in despair, as he remembered the acutely painful sensations caused him by this quarrel Most unpleasant of all was the first minute when, on coming, happy and good-humored, from the theater, with a huge pear in his hand for his wife, he had not found his wife in the drawing-room, to his surprise had not found her in the study either, and saw her at last in her bedroom with the unlucky letter that revealed everything in her hand She, his Dolly, forever fussing and worrying over household details, and limited in her ideas, as he considered, was sitting perfectly still with the letter in her hand, looking at him with an expression of horror, despair, and indignation "What's this? this?" she asked, pointing to the letter And at this recollection, Stepan Arkadyevitch, as is so often the case, was not so much annoyed at the fact itself as at the way in which he had met his wife's words There happened to him at that instant what does happen to people when they are unexpectedly caught in something very disgraceful He did not succeed in adapting his face to the position in which he was placed towards his wife by the discovery of his fault Instead of being hurt, denying, defending himself, begging forgiveness, instead of remaining indifferent even—anything would have been better than what he did do—his face utterly involuntarily (reflex spinal action, reflected Stepan Arkadyevitch, who was fond of physiology)—utterly involuntarily assumed its habitual, goodhumored, and therefore idiotic smile This idiotic smile he could not forgive himself Catching sight of that smile, Dolly shuddered as though at physical pain, broke out with her characteristic heat into a flood of cruel words, and rushed out of the room Since then she had refused to see her husband "It's that idiotic smile that's to blame for it all," thought Stepan Arkadyevitch "But what's to be done? What's to be done?" he said to himself in despair, and found no answer Chapter Stepan Arkadyevitch was a truthful man in his relations with himself He was incapable of deceiving himself and persuading himself that he repented of his conduct He could not at this date repent of the fact that he, a handsome, susceptible man of thirty-four, was not in love with his wife, the mother of five living and two dead children, and only a year younger than himself All he repented of was that he had not succeeded better in hiding it from his wife But he felt all the difficulty of his position and was sorry for his wife, his children, and himself Possibly he might have managed to conceal his sins better from his wife if he had anticipated that the knowledge of them would have had such an effect on her He had never clearly thought out the subject, but he had vaguely conceived that his wife must long ago have suspected him of being unfaithful to her, and shut her eyes to the fact He had even supposed that she, a worn-out woman no longer young or good-looking, and in no way remarkable or interesting, merely a good mother, ought from a sense of fairness to take an indulgent view It had turned out quite the other way "Oh, it's awful! oh dear, oh dear! awful!" Stepan Arkadyevitch kept repeating to himself, and he could think of nothing to be done "And how well things were going up till now! how well we got on! She was contented and happy in her children; I never interfered with her in anything; I let her manage the children and the house just as she liked It's true it's bad her having been a governess in our house That's bad! There's something common, vulgar, in flirting with one's governess But what a governess!" (He vividly recalled the roguish black eyes of Mlle Roland and her smile.) "But after all, while she was in the house, I kept myself in hand And the worst of it all is that she's already…it seems as if ill-luck would have it so! Oh, oh! But what, what is to be done?" There was no solution, but that universal solution which life gives to all questions, even the most complex and insoluble That answer is: one must live in the needs of the day—that is, forget oneself To forget himself in sleep was impossible now, at least till nighttime; he could not go back now to the music sung by the decanter-women; so he must forget himself in the dream of daily life "Then we shall see," Stepan Arkadyevitch said to himself, and getting up he put on a gray dressinggown lined with blue silk, tied the tassels in a knot, and, drawing a deep breath of air into his broad, bare chest, he walked to the window with his usual confident step, turning out his feet that carried his full frame so easily He pulled up the blind and rang the bell loudly It was at once answered by the appearance of an old friend, his valet, Matvey, carrying his clothes, his boots, and a telegram Matvey was followed by the barber with all the necessaries for shaving "Are there any papers from the office?" asked Stepan Arkadyevitch, taking the telegram and seating himself at the looking-glass "On the table," replied Matvey, glancing with inquiring sympathy at his master; and, after a short pause, he added with a sly smile, "They've sent from the carriage-jobbers." Stepan Arkadyevitch made no reply, he merely glanced at Matvey in the looking-glass In the glance, in which their eyes met in the looking-glass, it was clear that they understood one another Stepan Arkadyevitch's eyes asked: "Why you tell me that? don't you know?" Matvey put his hands in his jacket pockets, thrust out one leg, and gazed silently, good-humoredly, with a faint smile, at his master "I told them to come on Sunday, and till then not to trouble you or themselves for nothing," he said He had obviously prepared the sentence beforehand Stepan Arkadyevitch saw Matvey wanted to make a joke and attract attention to himself Tearing open the telegram, he read it through, guessing at the words, misspelt as they always are in telegrams, and his face brightened "Matvey, my sister Anna Arkadyevna will be here tomorrow," he said, checking for a minute the sleek, plump hand of the barber, cutting a pink path through his long, curly whiskers "Thank God!" said Matvey, showing by this response that he, like his master, realized the significance of this arrival—that is, that Anna Arkadyevna, the sister he was so fond of, might bring about a reconciliation between husband and wife "Alone, or with her husband?" inquired Matvey Stepan Arkadyevitch could not answer, as the barber was at work on his upper lip, and he raised one finger Matvey nodded at the looking-glass "Alone Is the room to be got ready upstairs?" "Inform Darya Alexandrovna: where she orders." "Darya Alexandrovna?" Matvey repeated, as though in doubt "Yes, inform her Here, take the telegram; give it to her, and then what she tells you." "You want to try it on," Matvey understood, but he only said, "Yes sir." Stepan Arkadyevitch was already washed and combed and ready to be dressed, when Matvey, stepping deliberately in his creaky boots, came back into the room with the telegram in his hand The barber had gone "Darya Alexandrovna told me to inform you that she is going away Let him do—that is you—do as he likes," he said, laughing only with his eyes, and putting his hands in his pockets, he watched his master with his head on one side Stepan Arkadyevitch was silent a minute Then a good-humored and rather pitiful smile showed itself on his handsome face "Eh, Matvey?" he said, shaking his head "It's all right, sir; she will come round," said Matvey "Come round?" "Yes, sir." "Do you think so? Who's there?" asked Stepan Arkadyevitch, hearing the rustle of a woman's dress at the door "It's I," said a firm, pleasant, woman's voice, and the stern, pockmarked face of Matrona Philimonovna, the nurse, was thrust in at the doorway "Well, what is it, Matrona?" queried Stepan Arkadyevitch, going up to her at the door Although Stepan Arkadyevitch was completely in the wrong as regards his wife, and was conscious of this himself, almost every one in the house (even the nurse, Darya Alexandrovna's chief ally) was on his side "Well, what now?" he asked disconsolately "Go to her, sir; own your fault again Maybe God will aid you She is suffering so, it's sad to see her; and besides, everything in the house is topsy-turvy You must have pity, sir, on the children Beg her forgiveness, sir There's no help for it! One must take the consequences…" "But she won't see me." "You your part God is merciful; pray to God, sir, pray to God." "Come, that'll do, you can go," said Stepan Arkadyevitch, blushing suddenly "Well now, dress me." He turned to Matvey and threw off his dressing-gown decisively Matvey was already holding up the shirt like a horse's collar, and, blowing off some invisible speck, he slipped it with obvious pleasure over the well-groomed body of his master Chapter When he was dressed, Stepan Arkadyevitch sprinkled some scent on himself, pulled down his shirtcuffs, distributed into his pockets his cigarettes, pocketbook, matches, and watch with its double chain and seals, and shaking out his handkerchief, feeling himself clean, fragrant, healthy, and physically at ease, in spite of his unhappiness, he walked with a slight swing on each leg into the dining-room, where coffee was already waiting for him, and beside the coffee, letters and papers from the office He read the letters One was very unpleasant, from a merchant who was buying a forest on his wife's property To sell this forest was absolutely essential; but at present, until he was reconciled with his wife, the subject could not be discussed The most unpleasant thing of all was that his pecuniary interests should in this way enter into the question of his reconciliation with his wife And the idea that he might be led on by his interests, that he might seek a reconciliation with his wife on account of the sale of the forest—that idea hurt him When he had finished his letters, Stepan Arkadyevitch moved the office-papers close to him, rapidly looked through two pieces of business, made a few notes with a big pencil, and pushing away the papers, turned to his coffee As he sipped his coffee, he opened a still damp morning paper, and began reading it Stepan Arkadyevitch took in and read a liberal paper, not an extreme one, but one advocating the views held by the majority And in spite of the fact that science, art, and politics had no special interest for him, he firmly held those views on all these subjects which were held by the majority and by his paper, and he only changed them when the majority changed them—or, more strictly speaking, he did not change them, but they imperceptibly changed of themselves within him Stepan Arkadyevitch had not chosen his political opinions or his views; these political opinions and views had come to him of themselves, just as he did not choose the shapes of his hat and coat, but simply took those that were being worn And for him, living in a certain society—owing to the need, ordinarily developed at years of discretion, for some degree of mental activity—to have views was just as indispensable as to have a hat If there was a reason for his preferring liberal to conservative views, which were held also by many of his circle, it arose not from his considering liberalism more rational, but from its being in closer accordance with his manner of life The liberal party said that in Russia everything is wrong, and certainly Stepan Arkadyevitch had many debts and was decidedly short of money The liberal party said that marriage is an institution quite out of date, and that it needs reconstruction; and family life certainly afforded Stepan Arkadyevitch little gratification, and forced him into lying and hypocrisy, which was so repulsive to his nature The liberal party said, or rather allowed it to be understood, that religion is only a curb to keep in check the barbarous classes of the people; and Stepan Arkadyevitch could not get through even a short service without his legs aching from standing up, and could never make out what was the object of all the terrible and high-flown language about another world when life might be so very amusing in this world And with all this, Stepan Arkadyevitch, who liked a joke, was fond of puzzling a plain man by saying that if he prided himself on his origin, he ought not to stop at Rurik and disown the first founder of his family—the monkey And so Liberalism had become a habit of Stepan Arkadyevitch's, and he liked his newspaper, as he did his cigar after dinner, for the slight fog it diffused in his brain He read the leading article, in which it was maintained that it was quite senseless in our day to raise an outcry that radicalism was threatening to swallow up all conservative elements, and that the government ought to take measures to crush the revolutionary hydra; that, on the contrary, "in our opinion the danger lies not in that fantastic revolutionary hydra, but in the obstinacy of traditionalism clogging progress," etc., etc He read another article, too, a financial one, which alluded to Bentham and Mill, and dropped some innuendoes reflecting on the ministry With his characteristic quickwittedness he caught the drift of each innuendo, divined whence it came, at whom and on what ground it was aimed, and that afforded him, as it always did, a certain satisfaction But today that satisfaction was embittered by Matrona Philimonovna's advice and the unsatisfactory state of the household He read, too, that Count Beist was rumored to have left for Wiesbaden, and that one need have no more gray hair, and of the sale of a light carriage, and of a young person seeking a situation; but these items of information did not give him, as usual, a quiet, ironical gratification Having finished the paper, a second cup of coffee and a roll and butter, he got up, shaking the crumbs of the roll off his waistcoat; and, squaring his broad chest, he smiled joyously: not because there was anything particularly agreeable in his mind —the joyous smile was evoked by a good digestion But this joyous smile at once recalled everything to him, and he grew thoughtful Two childish voices (Stepan Arkadyevitch recognized the voices of Grisha, his youngest boy, and Tanya, his eldest girl) were heard outside the door They were carrying something, and dropped it "I told you not to sit passengers on the roof," said the little girl in English; "there, pick them up!" "Everything's in confusion," thought Stepan Arkadyevitch; "there are the children running about by themselves." And going to the door, he called them They threw down the box, that represented a train, and came in to their father The little girl, her father's favorite, ran up boldly, embraced him, and laughingly on his neck, enjoying as she always did the smell of scent that came from his whiskers At last the little girl kissed his face, which was flushed from his stooping posture and beaming with tenderness, loosed her hands, and was about to run away again; but her father held her back "How is mamma?" he asked, passing his hand over his daughter's smooth, soft little neck "Good morning," he said, smiling to the boy, who had come up to greet him He was conscious that he loved the boy less, and always tried to be fair; but the boy felt it, and did not respond with a smile to his father's chilly smile "Mamma? She is up," answered the girl Stepan Arkadyevitch sighed "That means that she's not slept again all night," he thought "Well, is she cheerful?" The little girl knew that there was a quarrel between her father and mother, and that her mother could not be cheerful, and that her father must be aware of this, and that he was pretending when he asked about it so lightly And she blushed for her father He at once perceived it, and blushed too "I don't know," she said "She did not say we must our lessons, but she said we were to go for a walk with Miss Hoole to grandmamma's." "Well, go, Tanya, my darling Oh, wait a minute, though," he said, still holding her and stroking her soft little hand He took off the mantelpiece, where he had put it yesterday, a little box of sweets, and gave her two, picking out her favorites, a chocolate and a fondant "For Grisha?" said the little girl, pointing to the chocolate "Yes, yes." And still stroking her little shoulder, he kissed her on the roots of her hair and neck, and let her go "The carriage is ready," said Matvey; "but there's some one to see you with a petition." "Been here long?" asked Stepan Arkadyevitch "Half an hour." "How many times have I told you to tell me at once?" "One must let you drink your coffee in peace, at least," said Matvey, in the affectionately gruff tone with which it was impossible to be angry "Well, show the person up at once," said Oblonsky, frowning with vexation The petitioner, the widow of a staff captain Kalinin, came with a request impossible and unreasonable; but Stepan Arkadyevitch, as he generally did, made her sit down, heard her to the end attentively without interrupting her, and gave her detailed advice as to how and to whom to apply, and even wrote her, in his large, sprawling, good and legible hand, a confident and fluent little note to a personage who might be of use to her Having got rid of the staff captain's widow, Stepan Arkadyevitch took his hat and stopped to recollect whether he had forgotten anything It appeared that he had forgotten nothing except what he wanted to forget—his wife "Ah, yes!" He bowed his head, and his handsome face assumed a harassed expression "To go, or not to go!" he said to himself; and an inner voice told him he must not go, that nothing could come of it but falsity; that to amend, to set right their relations was impossible, because it was impossible to make her attractive again and able to inspire love, or to make him an old man, not susceptible to love Except deceit and lying nothing could come of it now; and deceit and lying were opposed to his nature "It must be some time, though: it can't go on like this," he said, trying to give himself courage He squared his chest, took out a cigarette, took two whiffs at it, flung it into a mother-of-pearl ashtray, and with rapid steps walked through the drawing room, and opened the other door into his wife's bedroom Chapter Darya Alexandrovna, in a dressing jacket, and with her now scanty, once luxuriant and beautiful hair fastened up with hairpins on the nape of her neck, with a sunken, thin face and large, startled eyes, which looked prominent from the thinness of her face, was standing among a litter of all sorts of things scattered all over the room, before an open bureau, from which she was taking something Hearing her husband's steps, she stopped, looking towards the door, and trying assiduously to give her features a severe and contemptuous expression She felt she was afraid of him, and afraid of the coming interview She was just attempting to what she had attempted to ten times already in these last three days—to sort out the children's things and her own, so as to take them to her mother's "I don't care for many of the papers, but that's unjust," said Sergey Ivanovitch "I would only make one condition," pursued the old prince "Alphonse Karr said a capital thing before the war with Prussia: 'You consider war to be inevitable? Very good Let everyone who advocates war be enrolled in a special regiment of advance-guards, for the front of every storm, of every attack, to lead them all!'" "A nice lot the editors would make!" said Katavasov, with a loud roar, as he pictured the editors he knew in this picked legion "But they'd run," said Dolly, "they'd only be in the way." "Oh, if they ran away, then we'd have grape-shot or Cossacks with whips behind them," said the prince "But that's a joke, and a poor one too, if you'll excuse my saying so, prince," said Sergey Ivanovitch "I don't see that it was a joke, that…" Levin was beginning, but Sergey Ivanovitch interrupted him "Every member of society is called upon to his own special work," said he "And men of thought are doing their work when they express public opinion And the single-hearted and full expression of public opinion is the service of the press and a phenomenon to rejoice us at the same time Twenty years ago we should have been silent, but now we have heard the voice of the Russian people, which is ready to rise as one man and ready to sacrifice itself for its oppressed brethren; that is a great step and a proof of strength." "But it's not only making a sacrifice, but killing Turks," said Levin timidly "The people make sacrifices and are ready to make sacrifices for their soul, but not for murder," he added, instinctively connecting the conversation with the ideas that had been absorbing his mind "For their soul? That's a most puzzling expression for a natural science man, you understand? What sort of thing is the soul?" said Katavasov, smiling "Oh, you know!" "No, by God, I haven't the faintest idea!" said Katavasov with a loud roar of laughter "'I bring not peace, but a sword,' says Christ," Sergey Ivanovitch rejoined for his part, quoting as simply as though it were the easiest thing to understand the very passage that had always puzzled Levin most "That's so, no doubt," the old man repeated again He was standing near them and responded to a chance glance turned in his direction "Ah, my dear fellow, you're defeated, utterly defeated!" cried Katavasov good-humoredly Levin reddened with vexation, not at being defeated, but at having failed to control himself and being drawn into argument "No, I can't argue with them," he thought; "they wear impenetrable armor, while I'm naked." He saw that it was impossible to convince his brother and Katavasov, and he saw even less possibility of himself agreeing with them What they advocated was the very pride of intellect that had almost been his ruin He could not admit that some dozens of men, among them his brother, had the right, on the ground of what they were told by some hundreds of glib volunteers swarming to the capital, to say that they and the newspapers were expressing the will and feeling of the people, and a feeling which was expressed in vengeance and murder He could not admit this, because he neither saw the expression of such feelings in the people among whom he was living, nor found them in himself (and he could not but consider himself one of the persons making up the Russian people), and most of all because he, like the people, did not know and could not know what is for the general good, though he knew beyond a doubt that this general good could be attained only by the strict observance of that law of right and wrong which has been revealed to every man, and therefore he could not wish for war or advocate war for any general objects whatever He said as Mihalitch did and the people, who had expressed their feeling in the traditional invitations of the Varyagi: "Be princes and rule over us Gladly we promise complete submission All the labor, all humiliations, all sacrifices we take upon ourselves; but we will not judge and decide." And now, according to Sergey Ivanovitch's account, the people had foregone this privilege they had bought at such a costly price He wanted to say too that if public opinion were an infallible guide, then why were not revolutions and the commune as lawful as the movement in favor of the Slavonic peoples? But these were merely thoughts that could settle nothing One thing could be seen beyond doubt—that was that at the actual moment the discussion was irritating Sergey Ivanovitch, and so it was wrong to continue it And Levin ceased speaking and then called the attention of his guests to the fact that the storm clouds were gathering, and that they had better be going home before it rained Chapter 17 The old prince and Sergey Ivanovitch got into the trap and drove off; the rest of the party hastened homewards on foot But the storm-clouds, turning white and then black, moved down so quickly that they had to quicken their pace to get home before the rain The foremost clouds, lowering and black as soot-laden smoke, rushed with extraordinary swiftness over the sky They were still two hundred paces from home and a gust of wind had already blown up, and every second the downpour might be looked for The children ran ahead with frightened and gleeful shrieks Darya Alexandrovna, struggling painfully with her skirts that clung round her legs, was not walking, but running, her eyes fixed on the children The men of the party, holding their hats on, strode with long steps beside her They were just at the steps when a big drop fell splashing on the edge of the iron guttering The children and their elders after them ran into the shelter of the house, talking merrily "Katerina Alexandrovna?" Levin asked of Agafea Mihalovna, who met them with kerchiefs and rugs in the hall "We thought she was with you," she said "And Mitya?" "In the copse, he must be, and the nurse with him." Levin snatched up the rugs and ran towards the copse In that brief interval of time the storm clouds had moved on, covering the sun so completely that it was dark as an eclipse Stubbornly, as though insisting on its rights, the wind stopped Levin, and tearing the leaves and flowers off the lime trees and stripping the white birch branches into strange unseemly nakedness, it twisted everything on one side—acacias, flowers, burdocks, long grass, and tall tree-tops The peasant girls working in the garden ran shrieking into shelter in the servants' quarters The streaming rain had already flung its white veil over all the distant forest and half the fields close by, and was rapidly swooping down upon the copse The wet of the rain spurting up in tiny drops could be smelt in the air Holding his head bent down before him, and struggling with the wind that strove to tear the wraps away from him, Levin was moving up to the copse and had just caught sight of something white behind the oak tree, when there was a sudden flash, the whole earth seemed on fire, and the vault of heaven seemed crashing overhead Opening his blinded eyes, Levin gazed through the thick veil of rain that separated him now from the copse, and to his horror the first thing he saw was the green crest of the familiar oak-tree in the middle of the copse uncannily changing its position "Can it have been struck?" Levin hardly had time to think when, moving more and more rapidly, the oak tree vanished behind the other trees, and he heard the crash of the great tree falling upon the others The flash of lightning, the crash of thunder, and the instantaneous chill that ran through him were all merged for Levin in one sense of terror "My God! my God! not on them!" he said And though he thought at once how senseless was his prayer that they should not have been killed by the oak which had fallen now, he repeated it, knowing that he could nothing better than utter this senseless prayer Running up to the place where they usually went, he did not find them there They were at the other end of the copse under an old lime-tree; they were calling him Two figures in dark dresses (they had been light summer dresses when they started out) were standing bending over something It was Kitty with the nurse The rain was already ceasing, and it was beginning to get light when Levin reached them The nurse was not wet on the lower part of her dress, but Kitty was drenched through, and her soaked clothes clung to her Though the rain was over, they still stood in the same position in which they had been standing when the storm broke Both stood bending over a perambulator with a green umbrella "Alive? Unhurt? Thank God!" he said, splashing with his soaked boots through the standing water and running up to them Kitty's rosy wet face was turned towards him, and she smiled timidly under her shapeless sopped hat "Aren't you ashamed of yourself? I can't think how you can be so reckless!" he said angrily to his wife "It wasn't my fault, really We were just meaning to go, when he made such a to-do that we had to change him We were just…" Kitty began defending herself Mitya was unharmed, dry, and still fast asleep "Well, thank God! I don't know what I'm saying!" They gathered up the baby's wet belongings; the nurse picked up the baby and carried it Levin walked beside his wife, and, penitent for having been angry, he squeezed her hand when the nurse was not looking Chapter 18 During the whole of that day, in the extremely different conversations in which he took part, only as it were with the top layer of his mind, in spite of the disappointment of not finding the change he expected in himself, Levin had been all the while joyfully conscious of the fulness of his heart After the rain it was too wet to go for a walk; besides, the storm clouds still about the horizon, and gathered here and there, black and thundery, on the rim of the sky The whole party spent the rest of the day in the house No more discussions sprang up; on the contrary, after dinner every one was in the most amiable frame of mind At first Katavasov amused the ladies by his original jokes, which always pleased people on their first acquaintance with him Then Sergey Ivanovitch induced him to tell them about the very interesting observations he had made on the habits and characteristics of common houseflies, and their life Sergey Ivanovitch, too, was in good spirits, and at tea his brother drew him on to explain his views of the future of the Eastern question, and he spoke so simply and so well, that everyone listened eagerly Kitty was the only one who did not hear it all—she was summoned to give Mitya his bath A few minutes after Kitty had left the room she sent for Levin to come to the nursery Leaving his tea, and regretfully interrupting the interesting conversation, and at the same time uneasily wondering why he had been sent for, as this only happened on important occasions, Levin went to the nursery Although he had been much interested by Sergey Ivanovitch's views of the new epoch in history that would be created by the emancipation of forty millions of men of Slavonic race acting with Russia, a conception quite new to him, and although he was disturbed by uneasy wonder at being sent for by Kitty, as soon as he came out of the drawing room and was alone, his mind reverted at once to the thoughts of the morning And all the theories of the significance of the Slav element in the history of the world seemed to him so trivial compared with what was passing in his own soul, that he instantly forgot it all and dropped back into the same frame of mind that he had been in that morning He did not, as he had done at other times, recall the whole train of thought—that he did not need He fell back at once into the feeling which had guided him, which was connected with those thoughts, and he found that feeling in his soul even stronger and more definite than before He did not, as he had had to with previous attempts to find comforting arguments, need to revive a whole chain of thought to find the feeling Now, on the contrary, the feeling of joy and peace was keener than ever, and thought could not keep pace with feeling He walked across the terrace and looked at two stars that had come out in the darkening sky, and suddenly he remembered "Yes, looking at the sky, I thought that the dome that I see is not a deception, and then I thought something, I shirked facing something," he mused "But whatever it was, there can be no disproving it! I have but to think, and all will come clear!" Just as he was going into the nursery he remembered what it was he had shirked facing It was that if the chief proof of the Divinity was His revelation of what is right, how is it this revelation is confined to the Christian church alone? What relation to this revelation have the beliefs of the Buddhists, Mohammedans, who preached and did good too? It seemed to him that he had an answer to this question; but he had not time to formulate it to himself before he went into the nursery Kitty was standing with her sleeves tucked up over the baby in the bath Hearing her husband's footstep, she turned towards him, summoning him to her with her smile With one hand she was supporting the fat baby that lay floating and sprawling on its back, while with the other she squeezed the sponge over him "Come, look, look!" she said, when her husband came up to her "Agafea Mihalovna's right He knows us!" Mitya had on that day given unmistakable, incontestable signs of recognizing all his friends As soon as Levin approached the bath, the experiment was tried, and it was completely successful The cook, sent for with this object, bent over the baby He frowned and shook his head disapprovingly Kitty bent down to him, he gave her a beaming smile, propped his little hands on the sponge and chirruped, making such a queer little contented sound with his lips, that Kitty and the nurse were not alone in their admiration Levin, too, was surprised and delighted The baby was taken out of the bath, drenched with water, wrapped in towels, dried, and after a piercing scream, handed to his mother "Well, I am glad you are beginning to love him," said Kitty to her husband, when she had settled herself comfortably in her usual place, with the baby at her breast "I am so glad! It had begun to distress me You said you had no feeling for him." "No; did I say that? I only said I was disappointed." "What! disappointed in him?" "Not disappointed in him, but in my own feeling; I had expected more I had expected a rush of new delightful emotion to come as a surprise And then instead of that—disgust, pity…" She listened attentively, looking at him over the baby, while she put back on her slender fingers the rings she had taken off while giving Mitya his bath "And most of all, at there being far more apprehension and pity than pleasure Today, after that fright during the storm, I understand how I love him." Kitty's smile was radiant "Were you very much frightened?" she said "So was I too, but I feel it more now that it's over I'm going to look at the oak How nice Katavasov is! And what a happy day we've had altogether And you're so nice with Sergey Ivanovitch, when you care to be… Well, go back to them It's always so hot and steamy here after the bath." Chapter 19 Going out of the nursery and being again alone, Levin went back at once to the thought, in which there was something not clear Instead of going into the drawing room, where he heard voices, he stopped on the terrace, and leaning his elbows on the parapet, he gazed up at the sky It was quite dark now, and in the south, where he was looking, there were no clouds The storm had drifted on to the opposite side of the sky, and there were flashes of lightning and distant thunder from that quarter Levin listened to the monotonous drip from the lime trees in the garden, and looked at the triangle of stars he knew so well, and the Milky Way with its branches that ran through its midst At each flash of lightning the Milky Way, and even the bright stars, vanished, but as soon as the lightning died away, they reappeared in their places as though some hand had flung them back with careful aim "Well, what is it perplexes me?" Levin said to himself, feeling beforehand that the solution of his difficulties was ready in his soul, though he did not know it yet "Yes, the one unmistakable, incontestable manifestation of the Divinity is the law of right and wrong, which has come into the world by revelation, and which I feel in myself, and in the recognition of which—I don't make myself, but whether I will or not—I am made one with other men in one body of believers, which is called the church Well, but the Jews, the Mohammedans, the Confucians, the Buddhists—what of them?" he put to himself the question he had feared to face "Can these hundreds of millions of men be deprived of that highest blessing without which life has no meaning?" He pondered a moment, but immediately corrected himself "But what am I questioning?" he said to himself "I am questioning the relation to Divinity of all the different religions of all mankind I am questioning the universal manifestation of God to all the world with all those misty blurs What am I about? To me individually, to my heart has been revealed a knowledge beyond all doubt, and unattainable by reason, and here I am obstinately trying to express that knowledge in reason and words "Don't I know that the stars don't move?" he asked himself, gazing at the bright planet which had shifted its position up to the topmost twig of the birch-tree "But looking at the movements of the stars, I can't picture to myself the rotation of the earth, and I'm right in saying that the stars move "And could the astronomers have understood and calculated anything, if they had taken into account all the complicated and varied motions of the earth? All the marvelous conclusions they have reached about the distances, weights, movements, and deflections of the heavenly bodies are only founded on the apparent motions of the heavenly bodies about a stationary earth, on that very motion I see before me now, which has been so for millions of men during long ages, and was and will be always alike, and can always be trusted And just as the conclusions of the astronomers would have been vain and uncertain if not founded on observations of the seen heavens, in relation to a single meridian and a single horizon, so would my conclusions be vain and uncertain if not founded on that conception of right, which has been and will be always alike for all men, which has been revealed to me as a Christian, and which can always be trusted in my soul The question of other religions and their relations to Divinity I have no right to decide, and no possibility of deciding." "Oh, you haven't gone in then?" he heard Kitty's voice all at once, as she came by the same way to the drawing-room "What is it? you're not worried about anything?" she said, looking intently at his face in the starlight But she could not have seen his face if a flash of lightning had not hidden the stars and revealed it In that flash she saw his face distinctly, and seeing him calm and happy, she smiled at him "She understands," he thought; "she knows what I'm thinking about Shall I tell her or not? Yes, I'll tell her." But at the moment he was about to speak, she began speaking "Kostya! something for me," she said; "go into the corner room and see if they've made it all right for Sergey Ivanovitch I can't very well See if they've put the new wash stand in it." "Very well, I'll go directly," said Levin, standing up and kissing her "No, I'd better not speak of it," he thought, when she had gone in before him "It is a secret for me alone, of vital importance for me, and not to be put into words "This new feeling has not changed me, has not made me happy and enlightened all of a sudden, as I had dreamed, just like the feeling for my child There was no surprise in this either Faith—or not faith—I don't know what it is—but this feeling has come just as imperceptibly through suffering, and has taken firm root in my soul "I shall go on in the same way, losing my temper with Ivan the coachman, falling into angry discussions, expressing my opinions tactlessly; there will be still the same wall between the holy of holies of my soul and other people, even my wife; I shall still go on scolding her for my own terror, and being remorseful for it; I shall still be as unable to understand with my reason why I pray, and I shall still go on praying; but my life now, my whole life apart from anything that can happen to me, every minute of it is no more meaningless, as it was before, but it has the positive meaning of goodness, which I have the power to put into it." 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English *** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ANNA KARENINA *** Etext prepared by David Brannan Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy Translated by Constance Garnett Part One Chapter Happy families...The Project Gutenberg EBook of Anna Karenina, by Leo Tolstoy This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions... society The Russian fashion of match-making by the offices of intermediate persons was for some reason considered unseemly; it was ridiculed by every one, and by the princess herself But how girls