Page:Anna Karenina.djvu/1066

 "That's certainly so."

"Well, now! Ask him about it," said Levin. "He does n't know. He does n't think.—Have you heard about the war, Mikhaïluitch?" asked he of the old man. "You know what was read on Sunday at church, don't you? What do you think? Ought we to fight for the Christians?"

"Why should we think? Our Emperor Aleksander Nikolayevitch will think for us, as in everything else. He knows what to do.—Should you like some more bread? shall I give some to the little lad?" asked he, turning to Darya Aleksandrovna, and pointing to Grisha, who was munching a crust.

"What's the use of asking him?" said Sergyeï Ivanovitch. "We have seen, and still see, hundreds and hundreds of men abandoning all they possess, giving their last penny, enlisting and trooping from every corner of Russia, all clearly and definitely expressing their thought and purpose. What does that signify?"

"It signifies, in my opinion," said Levin, beginning to get excited, " that out of eighty millions of men, there will always be found hundreds, and even thousands, who have lost their social position, are restless, and are ready to take up the first adventure that comes along, whether it is to follow Pugatchof or to go to Khiva or to fight in Serbia."

"I tell you they are not adventurers who devote themselves to this work, but they are the best representatives of the nation," cried Sergyeï Ivanuitch, excitedly, as if he were defending his last position. "There are the contributions; is n't that a test of popular feeling?"

"That word 'people' is so vague," said Levin; "long-haired scribblers, professors, and perhaps one in a thousand among the peasants understand what it is all about, but the rest of the eighty millions do as Mikhailuitch here does. They not only don't express their will, but they have n't the slightest idea that they have any will to express. What right, then, have we to say that this is the will of the people?"