On reaching home Prince Andrey began looking at his life in Petersburg during the last four months, as though it were something new. He thought of the efforts he had made, and the people he had tried to see, and the history of his project of army reform, which had been accepted for consideration, and had been shelved because another scheme, a very poor one, had already been worked out and presented to the Tsar. He thought of the sittings of the committee, of which Berg was a member. He thought of the conscientious and prolonged deliberations that took place at those sittings on every point relating to the formalities of the sittings themselves, and the studious brevity with which anything relating to the reality of their duties was touched on in passing. He thought of his work on the legislative reforms, of his careful translation of the Roman and French codes into Russian, and he felt ashamed of himself. Then he vividly imagined Bogutcharovo, his pursuits in the country, his expedition to Ryazan; he thought of his peasants, of Dron the village elder; and applying the section on Personal Rights, which he had divided into paragraphs, to them, he marvelled how he could have so long busied himself on work so idle.
XIX
The next day Prince Andrev paid calls on various people whom he had not visited before, and among them on the Rostovs, with whom he had renewed his acquaintance at the ball. Apart from considerations of politeness, which necessitated a call on the Rostovs, Prince Andrey wanted to see at home that original, eager girl, who had left such a pleasant recollection with him.
Natasha was one of the first to meet him. She was in a blue everyday dress, in which she struck Prince Andrey as looking prettier than in her ball-dress. She and all the family received Prince Andrey like an old friend, simply and cordially. All the family, which Prince Andrey had once criticised so severely, now seemed to him to consist of excellent, simple, kindly people. The hospitality and good-nature of the old count, particularly striking apd attractive in Petersburg, was such that Prince Andrey could not refuse to stay to dinner. ‘Yes, these are good-natured, capital people,’ thought Bolkonsky. ‘Of course tl\ey have no conception, what a treasure they possess in Natasha; but they are good people, who make the best possible background for the strikingly poetical figure of that charming girl, so full of life!’
Prince Andrey was conscious in Natasha of a special world, utterly remote from him, brimful of joys unknown to him, that strange world, which even in the avenue at Otradnoe, and on that moonlight night at the window had tantalised him. Now that no longer tantalised him, it seemed no longer an alien world; but he himself was stepping into it, and finding new pleasures in it.
After dinner Natasha went to the clavichord, at Prince Andrey’s request, and began singing. Prince Andrey stood at the window talking to the ladies, and listened to her. In the middle of a phrase, Prince Andrey ceased speaking, and felt suddenly a lump in his throat from tears, the possibility of which he had not dreamed of in himself. He looked at Natasha singing, and something new and blissful stirred in his soul. He was happy, and at the same time he was sad. He certainly had nothing to weep about, but he was ready to weep. For what? For his past love? For the little princess? For his lost illusions? . . . For his hopes for the future? . . . Yes, and no. The chief thing which made him ready to weep was a sudden, vivid sense of the fearful contrast between something infinitely great and illimitable existing in him, and something limited and material, which he himself was, and even she was. This contrast made his heart ache, and rejoiced him while she was singing.
As soon as Natasha had finished singing, she went up to him, and asked how he liked her voice. She asked this, and was abashed after saying it, conscious that she ought not to have asked such a question. He smiled, looking at her, and said he liked her singing, as he liked everything she did.
436 WARANDPEACE
