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There was a merry chatter of peasant women over their linen at

the pond, and the ring of axes in the yard, where the peasants

were repairing ploughs and harrows. The real spring had come.

Chapter 13

Levin put on his big boots, and, for the first time, a cloth

jacket, instead of his fur cloak, and went out to look after his

farm, stepping over streams of water that flashed in the sunshine

and dazzled his eyes, and treading one minute on ice and the next

into sticky mud.