`Oh, so that's it! Come along, please,' said Stepan Arkadyevich, pointing in the direction of the dining room.

The men went into the dining room and went up to the table for hors d'oeuvres, laid with six sorts of vodka and as many kinds of cheese, some with little silver spades and some without, caviar, herrings, preserves of various kinds, and plates with slices of French bread.

The men stood round the strong-smelling spirits and salt delicacies, and the discussion of the Russification of Poland between Koznishev, Karenin and Pestsov, died down in anticipation of dinner.

Sergei Ivanovich was unequaled in his skill in winding up the most heated and serious argument by some unexpected pinch of Attic salt that changed the disposition of his opponent. He did this now.

Alexei Alexandrovich had been maintaining that the Russification of Poland could only be accomplished as a result of greater principles, which ought to be introduced by the Russian government.

Pestsov insisted that one country can absorb another only when it is the more densely populated.

Koznishev admitted both points, but with limitations. As they were going out of the drawing room to conclude the argument, Koznishev said smiling:

`So, then, for the Russification of our foreign populations there is but one method - to bring up as many children as one can. My brother and I are terribly at fault, I see. You married men - especially you, Stepan Arkadyevich - are the real patriots: what number have you reached?' he said, smiling genially at their host and holding out a tiny wineglass to him.

Everyone laughed, and Stepan Arkadyevich with particular good humor.

`Oh, yes, that's the best method!' he said, munching cheese and filling the wineglass with a special sort of vodka. The conversation dropped at the jest.

`This cheese is not bad. Shall I give you some?' said the master of the house. `Why, have you been going in for gymnastics again?' he asked Levin, pinching his muscle with his left hand. Levin smiled, bent his arm, and under Stepan Arkadyevich's fingers the muscles swelled up like a sound cheese, hard as a knob of iron, through the fine cloth of the coat.

`What biceps! A perfect Samson!'

`I imagine great strength is needed for hunting bears,' observed Alexei Alexandrovich, who had the mistiest notions about the chase. He cut off and spread with cheese a wafer of bread fine as a spiderweb.

Levin smiled.

`Not at all. Quite the contrary - a child can kill a bear,' he said, with a slight bow moving aside for the ladies, who were approaching the hors d'oeuvres table.

`You have killed a bear, I've been told!' said Kitty, trying assiduously to catch with her fork a perverse mushroom that would slip away, and shaking the lace over her white arm. `Are there bears on your place?' she added, turning her charming little head to him and smiling.

There was apparently nothing extraordinary in what she said, but what unutterable meaning there was for him in every sound, in every turn of her lips, her eyes, her hand as she said it! There was entreaty for forgiveness, and trust in him, and tenderness - soft, timid tenderness - and promise, and hope, and love for him, which he could not but believe in, and which suffocated him with happiness.