purpose of food is nourishment and the purpose of marriage is the
family, the whole question resolves itself into not eating more than one
can digest, and not having more wives or husbands than are needed for
the family--that is, one wife or one husband. Natasha needed a husband.
A husband was given her and he gave her a family. And she not only saw
no need of any other or better husband, but as all the powers of her
soul were intent on serving that husband and family, she could not
imagine and saw no interest in imagining how it would be if things were
different.

Natasha did not care for society in general, but prized the more the
society of her relatives--Countess Mary, and her brother, her mother,
and Sonya. She valued the company of those to whom she could come
striding disheveled from the nursery in her dressing gown, and with
joyful face show a yellow instead of a green stain on baby's napkin, and
from whom she could hear reassuring words to the effect that baby was
much better.

To such an extent had Natasha let herself go that the way she dressed
and did her hair, her ill-chosen words, and her jealousy--she was
jealous of Sonya, of the governess, and of every woman, pretty or
plain--were habitual subjects of jest to those about her. The general
opinion was that Pierre was under his wife's thumb, which was really
true. From the very first days of their married life Natasha had
announced her demands. Pierre was greatly surprised by his wife's view,
to him a perfectly novel one, that every moment of his life belonged to
her and to the family. His wife's demands astonished him, but they also
flattered him, and he submitted to them.

Pierre's subjection consisted in the fact that he not only dared not
flirt with, but dared not even speak smilingly to, any other woman; did
not dare dine at the Club as a pastime, did not dare spend money on a
whim, and did not dare absent himself for any length of time, except on
business--in which his wife included his intellectual pursuits, which
she did not in the least understand but to which she attributed great
importance. To make up for this, at home Pierre had the right to
regulate his life and that of the whole family exactly as he chose. At
home Natasha placed herself in the position of a slave to her husband,
and the whole household went on tiptoe when he was occupied--that is,
was reading or writing in his study. Pierre had but to show a partiality
for anything to get j