Page 730 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

press they don’t break. A wretched Russian nag they’ll
ruin, but keep good dray-horses—they won’t ruin them.
And so it is all round. We must raise our farming to a
higher level.’

‘Oh, if one only had the means to do it, Nikolay
Ivanovitch! It’s all very well for you; but for me, with a
son to keep at the university, lads to be educated at the
high school—how am I going to buy these dray-horses?’
‘Well, that’s what the land banks are for.’
‘To get what’s left me sold by auction? No, thank you.’
‘I don’t agree that it’s necessary or possible to raise the
level of agriculture still higher,’ said Levin. ‘I devote
myself to it, and I have means, but I can do nothing. As to
the banks, I don’t know to whom they’re any good. For
my part, anyway, whatever I’ve spent money on in the
way of husbandry, it has been a loss: stock—a loss,
machinery—a loss.’
‘That’s true enough,’ the gentleman with the gray
whiskers chimed in, positively laughing with satisfaction.
‘And I’m not the only one,’ pursued Levin. ‘I mix with
all the neighboring landowners, who are cultivating their
land on a rational system; they all, with rare exceptions,
are doing so at a loss. Come, tell us how does your land
do—does it pay?’ said Levin, and at once in Sviazhsky’s

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