he refreshments were, and again had a great sense of comfort
when he saw the waiters. The little old waiter pressed him to
have something, and Levin agreed. After eating a cutlet with
beans and talking to the waiters of their former masters, Levin,
not wishing to go back to the hall, where it was all so
distasteful to him, proceeded to walk through the galleries. The
galleries were full of fashionably dressed ladies, leaning over
the balustrade and trying not to lose a single word of what was
being said below. With the ladies were sitting and standing
smart lawyers, high school teachers in spectacles, and officers.
Everywhere they were talking of the election, and of how worried
the marshal was, and how splendid the discussions had been. In
one group Levin heard his brother's praises. One lady was
telling a lawyer:

"How glad I am I heard Koznishev! It's worth losing one's
dinner. He's exquisite! So clear and distinct all of it!
There's not one of you in the law courts that speaks like that.
The only one is Meidel, and he's not so eloquent by a long way."

Finding a free place, Levin leaned over the balustrade and began
looking and listening.

All the noblemen were sitting railed off behind barriers
according to their districts. In the middle of the room stood a
man in a uniform, who shouted in a loud, high voice:

"As a candidate for the marshalship of the nobility of the
province we call upon staff-captain Yevgeney Ivanovitch Apuhtin!"
A dead silence followed, and then a weak old voice was heard:
"Declined!"

"We call upon the privy councilor Pyotr Petrovitch Bol," the
voice began again.

"Declined!" a high boyish voice replied.

Again it began, and again "Declined." And so it went on for about
an hour. Levin, with his elbows on the balustrade, looked and
listened. At first he wondered and wanted to know what it meant;
then feeling sure that he could not make it out he began to be
bored. Then recalling all the excitement and vindictiveness he
had seen on all the faces, he felt sad; he made up his mind to
go, and went downstairs. As he passed through the entry to the
galleries he met a dejected high school boy walking up and down
with tired-looking eyes. On the stairs he met a couple--a lady
running quickly on her high heels and the jaunty deputy
prosecutor.

"I told you you weren't late," the deputy prosecutor was saying
at the moment when Levin moved aside to let the lady pass.

Levin was