had begun to collect engravings, he had tried his hand at painting. And now he took it up again, and employed in it that unexpended superfluity of energy which demanded employment. He had the capacity for appreciating art, and he thought that this was all that an artist needed. After having for some time hung doubtful which he would choose,—the religious, the historical, genre, or the realistic,—he actually began to paint. He understood all kinds, and could get inspiration from each; but he could not imagine that it was possible to be entirely ignorant of the various styles of art and to draw inspiration directly from what is in the soul itself, not caring what may be the result or to what famous school it may belong. As he did not know this, and drew his inspiration, not directly from life, but from life as expressed in art, so he became easily and speedily inspired, and with equal ease and rapidity succeeded in making what he undertook to paint a very good resemblance to that style which he was trying to imitate.
More than all others, the graceful and effective French school appealed to him, and in this style he began a portrait of Anna in an Italian costume; and this portrait seemed to him and to all that saw it very successful.
CHAPTER IX
The old, dilapidated palazzo into which they moved supplied Vronsky with the agreeable illusion that he was not so much a Russian proprietor, a shtalmeïster in retirement, as he was an enlightened amateur and protector of art, in his own modest way an artist, who had sacrificed society, his ties, his ambition, for a woman's love. This ancient palace, with its lofty stuccoed ceilings, its frescoed walls, its mosaic floors, its yellow tapestries, its thick, yellow curtains at the high windows, its vases on mantelpiece and consoles, its carved doors, and its melancholy halls hung with paintings, lent itself readily to his illusion.
This new rôle which Vronsky had chosen, together with their removal to the palazzo and acquaintance with
