Page 1574 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

wouldn’t believe it, I felt quite a young man. At a glimpse
of a pretty woman, my thoughts.... One dines and drinks a
glass of wine, and feels strong and ready for anything. I
came home to Russia—had to see my wife, and, what’s

more, go to my country place; and there, you’d hardly
believe it, in a fortnight I’d got into a dressing gown and
given up dressing for dinner. Needn’t say I had no
thoughts left for pretty women. I became quite an old
gentleman. There was nothing left for me but to think of
my eternal salvation. I went off to Paris—I was as right as
could be at once.’
Stepan Arkadyevitch felt exactly the difference that
Pyotr Oblonsky described. In Moscow he degenerated so
much that if he had had to be there for long together, he
might in good earnest have come to considering his
salvation; in Petersburg he felt himself a man of the world
again.
Between Princess Betsy Tverskaya and Stepan
Arkadyevitch there had long existed rather curious
relations. Stepan Arkadyevitch always flirted with her in
jest, and used to say to her, also in jest, the most unseemly
things, knowing that nothing delighted her so much. The
day after his conversation with Karenin, Stepan
Arkadyevitch went to see her, and felt so youthful that in

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