Page 400 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

favorite mare. Frou-Frou was a beast of medium size, not
altogether free from reproach, from a breeder’s point of
view. She was small-boned all over; though her chest was
extremely prominent in front, it was narrow. Her hind-

quarters were a little drooping, and in her fore-legs, and
still more in her hind-legs, there was a noticeable
curvature. The muscles of both hind- and fore-legs were
not very thick; but across her shoulders the mare was
exceptionally broad, a peculiarity specially striking now
that she was lean from training. The bones of her legs
below the knees looked no thicker than a finger from in
front, but were extraordinarily thick seen from the side.
She looked altogether, except across the shoulders, as it
were, pinched in at the sides and pressed out in depth. But
she had in the highest degree the quality that makes all
defects forgotten: that quality was blood, the blood that
tells, as the English expression has it. The muscles stood up
sharply under the network of sinews, covered with this
delicate, mobile skin, soft as satin, and they were hard a
bone. Her clean-cut head with prominent, bright, spirited
eyes, broadened out at the open nostrils, that showed the
red blood in the cartilage within. About all her figure, and
especially her head, there was a certain expression of
energy, and, at the same time, of softness. She was one of

399 of 1759