cause they were ours. We
had oats, clover, buckwheat, and vegetable seeds all ready for sowing,
and we used to examine them all and wonder what the crops would be like,
and everything Masha said to me seemed extraordinarily clever and fine.
This was the happiest time of my life.

Soon after Easter we were married in the parish church in the village of
Kurilovka three miles from Dubechnia. Masha wanted everything to be
simple; by her wish our bridesmen were peasant boys, only one deacon
sang, and we returned from the church in a little, shaky cart which she
drove herself. My sister was the only guest from the town. Masha had
sent her a note a couple of days before the wedding. My sister wore a
white dress and white gloves.... During the ceremony she cried softly
for joy and emotion, and her face had a maternal expression of infinite
goodness. She was intoxicated with our happiness and smiled as though
she were breathing a sweet perfume, and when I looked at her I
understood that there was nothing in the world higher in her eyes than
love, earthly love, and that she was always dreaming of love, secretly,
timidly, yet passionately. She embraced Masha and kissed her, and, not
knowing how to express her ecstasy, she said to her of me:

"He is a good man! A very good man."

Before she left us, she put on her ordinary clothes, and took me into
the garden to have a quiet talk.

"Father is very hurt that you have not written to him," she said. "You
should have asked for his blessing. But, at heart, he is very pleased.
He says that this marriage will raise you in the eyes of society, and
that under Maria Victorovna's influence you will begin to adopt a more
serious attitude toward life. In the evening now we talk about nothing
but you; and yesterday he even said, 'our Misail.' I was delighted. He
has evidently thought of a plan and I believe he wants to set you an
example of magnanimity, and that he will be the first to talk of
reconciliation. It is quite possible that one of these days he will come
and see you here."

She made the sign of the cross over me and said:

"Well, God bless you. Be happy. Aniuta Blagovo is a very clever girl.
She says of your marriage that God has sent you a new ordeal. Well?
Married life is not made up only of joy but of suffering as well. It is
impossible to avoid it."

Masha and I walked about three miles with her, and then walked home
quietly and silently, as though it were a rest for both