Page 747 - ANNA KARENINA

Anna Karenina

said a great deal but never said what was their real object.
Moreover (Levin felt that the irascible landowner had
been right) the peasants made their first and unalterable
condition of any agreement whatever that they should not

be forced to any new methods of tillage of any kind, nor
to use new implements. They agreed that the modern
plough ploughed better, that the scarifier did the work
more quickly, but they found thousands of reasons that
made it out of the question for them to use either of them;
and though he had accepted the conviction that he would
have to lower the standard of cultivation, he felt sorry to
give up improved methods, the advantages of which were
so obvious. But in spite of all these difficulties he got his
way, and by autumn the system was working, or at least so
it seemed to him.
At first Levin had thought of giving up the whole
farming of the land just as it was to the peasants, the
laborers, and the bailiff on new conditions of partnership;
but he was very soon convinced that this was impossible,
and determined to divide it up. The cattle-yard, the
garden, hay fields, and arable land, divided into several
parts, had to be made into separate lots. The simple-
hearted cowherd, Ivan, who, Levin fancied, understood
the matter better than any of them, collecting together a

746 of 1759