CHAPTER III

　　"No, Papa. Forgive me if I have caused you unpleasantness. Iunderstand it all less than you do."

　　"Devil take all these peasants, and money matters, and carryingsforward from page to page," he thought. "I used to understand what a'corner' and the stakes at cards meant, but carrying forward toanother page I don't understand at all," said he to himself, and afterthat he did not meddle in business affairs. But once the countesscalled her son and informed him that she had a promissory note fromAnna Mikhaylovna for two thousand rubles, and asked him what hethought of doing with it.

　　"This," answered Nicholas. "You say it rests with me. Well, Idon't like Anna Mikhaylovna and I don't like Boris, but they wereour friends and poor. Well then, this!" and he tore up the note, andby so doing caused the old countess to weep tears of joy. Afterthat, young Rostov took no further part in any business affairs, butdevoted himself with passionate enthusiasm to what was to him a newpursuit- the chase- for which his father kept a large establishment.BK7|CH3

　　CHAPTER III

　　The weather was already growing wintry and morning frostscongealed an earth saturated by autumn rains. The verdure hadthickened and its bright green stood out sharply against thebrownish strips of winter rye trodden down by the cattle, andagainst the pale-yellow stubble of the spring buckwheat. The woodedravines and the copses, which at the end of August had still beengreen islands amid black fields and stubble, had become golden andbright-red islands amid the green winter rye. The hares had alreadyhalf changed their summer coats, the fox cubs were beginning toscatter, and the young wolves were bigger than dogs. It was the besttime of the year for the chase. The hounds of that ardent youngsportsman Rostov had not merely reached hard winter condition, butwere so jaded that at a meeting of the huntsmen it was decided to givethem a three days' rest and then, on the sixteenth of September, to goon a distant expedition, starting from the oak grove where there wasan undisturbed litter of wolf cubs.

　　All that day the hounds remained at home. It was frosty and theair was sharp, but toward evening the sky became overcast and it beganto thaw. On the fifteenth, when young Rostov, in his dressing gown,looked out of the window, he saw it was an unsurpassable morning forhunting: it was as if the sky were melting and sinking to the earthwithout any wind. The only motion in the air was that of the dripping,microscopic particles of drizzling mist. The bare twigs in thegarden were hung with transparent drops which fell on the freshlyfallen leaves. The earth in the kitchen garden looked wet and blackand glistened like poppy seed and at a short distance merged intothe dull, moist veil of mist. Nicholas went out into the wet and muddyporch. There was a smell of decaying leaves and of dog. Milka, ablack-spotted, broad-haunched bitch with prominent black eyes, gotup on seeing her master, stretched her hind legs, lay down like ahare, and then suddenly jumped up and licked him right on his nose andmustache. Another borzoi, a dog, catching sight of his master from thegarden path, arched his back and, rushing headlong toward the porchwith lifted tail, began rubbing himself against his legs.