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The cowherd girls, picking up their petticoats, ran splashing

through the mud with bare legs, still white, not yet brown from

the sun, waving brush wood in their hands, chasing the calves

that frolicked in the mirth of spring.

After admiring the young ones of that year, who were particularly

fine-the early calves were the size of a peasant's cow, and

Pava's daughter, at three months old, was as big as a

yearling-Levin gave orders for a trough to be brought out and for

them to be fed in the paddock. But it appeared that as the

paddock had not been used during the winter, the hurdles made in

the autumn for it were broken. He sent for the carpenter, who,

according to his orders, ought to have been at work at the

thrashing machine. But it appeared that the carpenter was

repairing the harrows, which ought to have been repaired before

Lent. This was very annoying to Levin. It was annoying to come

upon that everlasting slovenliness in the farm work against which

he had been striving with all his might for so many years. The

hurdles, as he ascertained, being not wanted in winter, had been

carried to the cart-horses' stable; and there broken, as they

were of light construction, only meant for feeding calves.