Page:Anna Karenina.djvu/339

 revealed the chief reason for his indifference to the communal affairs.

"Maybe all this is a good thing," said he; "but why should I put myself out to have medical dispensaries located which I shall never make use of, or schools where I shall never send my children, and where the peasants won't want to send their children, and where I am not sure that it is wise to send them, anyway?"

Sergyeï Ivanovitch for a moment was disconcerted by this unexpected way of looking at the matter; but he immediately developed a new plan of attack. He was silent, pulled in one of his lines and wound it up; then with a smile he turned to his brother:—

"Now, excuse me. .... In the first place, the dispensary has proved necessary. Here, we ourselves have just sent for the communal doctor for Agafya Mikhaïlovna."

"Well, I still think her wrist was out of joint."

"That remains to be proved. .... In the next place, the muzhik who can read is a better workman, and more useful to you."

"Oh, no!" replied Konstantin Levin, resolutely. "Ask any one you please, they will tell you that the educated muzhik is far worse as a laborer. He will not repair the roads; and, when they build bridges, he will only steal the planks."

"Now, that is not the point," said Sergyeï, frowning because he did not like contradictions, and especially those that leaped from one subject to another, and kept bringing up new arguments without any apparent connection, so that it was impossible to know what to say in reply. "That is not the point. Excuse me. Do you admit that education is a benefit to the peasantry?"

"I do," said Levin, at haphazard, and instantly he saw that he had not said what he thought. He realized that, by making this admission, it would be easy to convict him of speaking nonsense. How it would be brought up against him he did not know; but he knew that he would surely be shown his logical inconsequence, and he awaited the demonstration. It came much sooner than he expected.