Page 1371 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

The dinner, the wine, the decoration of the table were
all very good; but it was all like what Darya Alexandrovna
had seen at formal dinners and balls which of late years had
become quite unfamiliar to her; it all had the same

impersonal and constrained character, and so on an
ordinary day and in a little circle of friends it made a
disagreeable impression on her.
After dinner they sat on the terrace, then they
proceeded to play lawn tennis. The players, divided into
two parties, stood on opposite sides of a tightly drawn net
with gilt poles on the carefully leveled and rolled croquet-
ground. Darya Alexandrovna made an attempt to play, but
it was a long time before she could understand the game,
and by the time she did understand it, she was so tired that
she sat down with Princess Varvara and simply looked on
at the players. Her partner, Tushkevitch, gave up playing
too, but the others kept the game up for a long time.
Sviazhsky and Vronsky both played very well and
seriously. They kept a sharp lookout on the balls served to
them, and without haste or getting in each other’s way,
they ran adroitly up to them, waited for the rebound, and
neatly and accurately returned them over the net.
Veslovsky played worse than the others. He was too eager,
but he kept the players lively with his high spirits. His

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