Page:Anna Karenina.djvu/233

 Levin of the unfairness of his criticism, "and nothing but fire-wood. There will not be much more than thirty cords to the acre, and he pays me at the rate of two hundred rubles."

Levin smiled scornfully.

"I know these city people," he thought, "who, coming twice in ten years into the country, and learning two or three country words, which they use appropriately or inappropriately, are firmly persuaded that they know it all. Wretched! only thirty cords! he speaks words without knowing what he is talking about."

"I do not pretend to teach you what you write in your office," said he, "and, if I needed, I would even ask your advice. But you are so sure that you understand this whole document about the wood. It is hard. Have you counted the trees?"

"What? Count my trees?" asked Stepan Arkadyevitch, with a laugh, and still trying to get his friend out of his ill-humor. "Count the sands, the rays of the planets—though a lofty genius might .... "

"Well, now! I tell you the lofty genius of Rabinin may! Never does a merchant purchase without counting,—unless, indeed, the wood is given away for nothing as you have done. I know your forest, I go hunting there every year; and your forest is worth five hundred rubles a desyatin cash down; and he has given you only two hundred, and on a long term. That means you make him a present of thirty thousand."

"Well, enough of imaginary receipts," said Stepan Arkadyevitch, plaintively. "Why did n't some one offer me this price?"

"Because the merchants connive together. I have had to do with all of them; I know them. They are not merchants, but speculators. None of them is satisfied with a profit less than ten or fifteen percent. They wait till they can buy for twenty kopeks what is worth a ruble."

"Well, enough; you are out of sorts."