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And Levin rode through the slush of the farmyard to the gate and

out into the open country, his good little horse, after his long

inactivity, stepping out gallantly, snorting over the pools, and

asking, as it were, for guidance. If Levin had felt happy before

in the cattle pens and farmyard, he felt happier yet in the open

country. Swaying rhythmically with the ambling paces of his good

little cob, drinking in the warm yet fresh scent of the snow and

the air, as he rode through his forest over the crumbling, wasted

snow, still left in parts, and covered with dissolving tracks, he

rejoiced over every tree, with the moss reviving on its bark and

the buds swelling on its shoots. When he came out of the forest,

in the immense plain before him, his grass fields stretched in an

unbroken carpet of green, without one bare place or swamp, only

spotted here and there in the hollows with patches of melting

snow.