Page 625 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

Irrigation. But at first, when he did not yet feel secure in
his position, he knew it would affect too many interests,
and would be injudicious. Later on he had been engrossed
in other questions, and had simply forgotten the Board of

Irrigation. It went of itself, like all such boards, by the
mere force of inertia. (Many people gained their
livelihood by the Board of Irrigation, especially one highly
conscientious and musical family: all the daughters played
on stringed instruments, and Alexey Alexandrovitch knew
the family and had stood godfather to one of the elder
daughters.) The raising of this question by a hostile
department was in Alexey Alexandrovitch’s opinion a
dishonorable proceeding, seeing that in every department
there were things similar and worse, which no one
inquired into, for well-known reasons of official etiquette.
However, now that the glove had been thrown down to
him, he had boldly picked it up and demanded the
appointment of a special commission to investigate and
verify the working of the Board of Irrigation of the lands
in the Zaraisky province. But in compensation he gave no
quarter to the enemy either. He demanded the
appointment of another special commission to inquire into
the question of the Native Tribes Organization
Committee. The question of the Native Tribes had been

624 of 1759