lled one, there was
nothing in the marsh.

"Come, you see now that it was not that I grudged the marsh,"
said Levin, "only it's wasting time."

"Oh, no, it was jolly all the same. Did you see us?" said
Vassenka Veslovsky, clambering awkwardly into the wagonette with
his gun and his peewit in his hands. "How splendidly I shot
this bird! Didn't I? Well, shall we soon be getting to the real
place?"

The horses started off suddenly, Levin knocked his head against
the stock of someone's gun, and there was the report of a shot.
The gun did actually go off first, but that was how it seemed to
Levin. It appeared that Vassenka Veslovsky had pulled only one
trigger, and had left the other hammer still cocked. The charge
flew into the ground without doing harm to anyone. Stepan
Arkadyevitch shook his head and laughed reprovingly at Veslovsky.
But Levin had not the heart to reprove him. In the first place,
any reproach would have seemed to be called forth by the danger
he had incurred and the bump that had come up on Levin's
forehead. And besides, Veslovsky was at first so naively
distressed, and then laughed so good-humoredly and infectiously
at their general dismay, that one could not but laugh with him.

When they reached the second marsh, which was fairly large, and
would inevitably take some time to shoot over, Levin tried to
persuade them to pass it by. But Veslovsky again overpersuaded
him. Again, as the marsh was narrow, Levin, like a good host,
remained with the carriage.

Krak made straight for some clumps of sedge. Vassenka Veslovsky
was the first to run after the dog. Before Stepan Arkadyevitch
had time to come up, a grouse flew out. Veslovsky missed it and
it flew into an unmown meadow. This grouse was left for
Veslovsky to follow up. Krak found it again and pointed, and
Veslovsky shot it and went back to the carriage. "Now you go and
I'll stay with the horses," he said.

Levin had begun to feel the pangs of a sportsman's envy. He
handed the reins to Veslovsky and walked into the marsh.

Laska, who had been plaintively whining and fretting against the
injustice of her treatment, flew straight ahead to a hopeful
place that Levin knew well, and that Krak had not yet come upon.

"Why don't you stop her?" shouted Stepan Arkadyevitch.

"She won't scare them," answered Levin, sympathizing with his
bitch's pleasure and hurrying after her.

As she came nearer and nearer to the familiar breeding