‘Now I am all right,’ she said, and asking the vicomte to begin, she took up her work. Prince Ippolit, having brought the work-bag, joined the circle and moving a chair close to hers seated himself beside her.

Anna Mikhailovna was already embracing her and weeping. The countess wept too. They wept because they were friends, and because they were kind-hearted, and because they—friends from childhood—had to think about such a base thing as money, and because their youth was over … But those tears were pleasant to them both.

Ippolit is at least a quiet fool, but Anatole is an active one.

of a spinning-mill when he has set the hands to work, goes round and notices, here a spindle that has stopped or there one that creaks or makes more noise than it should, and hastens to check the machine or set it in proper motion, so Anna Pavlovna moved about her drawing-room, approaching now a silent, now a too noisy group, and by a word or sligh

chimerical.

He used to say that there are only two sources of human vice—idleness and superstition, and only two virtues—activity

And having got rid of this young man who did not know how to behave, she resumed her duties as hostess and continued to listen and watch, ready to help at any point where the conversation might happen to flag. As the foreman

First he had left a lady before she had finished speaking to him, and now he continued to speak to another who wished to get away.

reticule