United States or Philippines ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
"What, are you taking the third class?" asked Natalia Ivanovna, when Nekhludoff stopped before a third-class car and the porter, with Tarass, entered it. "Yes, I will have it more convenient then. Tarass is with me. Another thing," he added. "I have not yet given the Kusminskoie land to the peasants. So that, in case of my death, your children will inherit it."
The crowd stood talking in front of the house of the bailiff, and as Nekhludoff approached, the conversation ceased and the peasants, like those of Kusminskoie, removed their caps. It was a coarser crowd than the peasants of Kusminskoie, and almost all the peasants wore bast shoes and homespun shirts and caftans. Some of them were bare-footed and only in their shirts.
It was therefore necessary, in order to be prepared to follow Maslova to Siberia, upon which Nekhludoff was firmly resolved, to go to the villages and arrange his affairs there. First of all, he went to the Kusminskoie estate, the nearest, largest black-earth estate, which brought the greatest income.
The driver spoke about the manager of the Kusminskoie estate, not knowing that he was carrying its master, Nekhludoff purposely refrained from enlightening him. "A dandy German," he said, turning half around, cracking his long whip now over the heads, now under the horses. "There is nothing here to compare with his fine team of three bay horses. You ought to see him driving out with his wife!
Of all the things in the house Nekhludoff removed this picture and the letters. The rest he sold to the miller for a tenth part of its value. Recalling now the feeling of pity over the loss of his property which he had experienced in Kusminskoie, Nekhludoff wondered how he could have done so.
And when he asked himself the reason for it, he recalled the driver's account of the German's management. But by the time he was busying himself with the affairs of Kusminskoie he had forgotten it.
But, in order to complete that arrangement, it was necessary to sign an agreement and also make his will. The arrangement made for the Kusminskoie estate was to remain in force, only there remained to be determined what part of the rent he was to appropriate to himself, and what was to be left for the benefit of the peasants.
That did not solve the question, but it was a step toward its solution; it was a transition from a grosser to a less gross form of ownership of man. He also intended to act thus. Nekhludoff arrived at Kusminskoie about noon. In everything simplifying his life, he did not wire from the station of his arrival, but hired a two-horse country coach.
From Kusminskoie Nekhludoff went to Panovo, the estate left him by his aunts, and where he had first seen Katiousha. He intended to dispose of this land in the same manner as he disposed of the other, and also desired to learn all there was known about Katiousha, and to find out if it was true that their child had died.
Word Of The Day