another prayer, and arranged a pillow of fresh-mown grass; and composed himself for a nap, Levin did the same; and, in spite of the stubborn, sticky flies and insects tickling his heated face and body, he immediately went off to sleep, and did not wake until the sun came out on the other side of the laburnum bush and began to shine in his face. The starik had been long awake, and was sitting up cutting the children's hair.
Levin looked around him, and did not know where he was. Everything seemed so changed. The vast level of the mown meadow with its windrows of already fragrant hay was lighted and glorified in a new fashion by the oblique rays of the afternoon sun. The trimmed bushes down by the river, and the river itself, before invisible but now shining like steel with its windings; and the busy peasantry; and the high wall of grass, where the meadow was not yet mowed; and the young vultures flying high above the bare field,—all this was absolutely new to him.
Levin calculated how much had been mowed, and how much could still be done that day. The work accomplished by the forty-two men was considerable. The whole great meadow, which in the time of serfdom used to take thirty scythes two days, was now almost mowed; only a few corners with short rows were left. But Levin wanted to do as much as possible that day, and he was vexed at the sun which was sinking too early. He felt no fatigue; he only wanted to do more rapid work, and get as much done as was possible.
"Do you think we shall get Mashkin Verkh [1] mowed to-day?" he asked of the old man.
"If God allows; the sun is getting low. Will there be little sips of vodka for the boys?"
At the time of the mid-afternoon luncheon, when the men rested again, and the smokers were lighting their pipes, the elder announced to the "boys":—
"Mow Mashkin Verkh—extra vodka!"
"All right! Come on, Sef! Let's tackle it lively,
- ↑ Mashka's Hillside.
