And the bridal pair tried several times to understand what they had to do, and each time made some mistake and were corrected by the priest in a whisper. At last, having duly performed the ceremony, having made with the rings the sign of the cross over them, the priest handed Kitty the big ring, and Levin the little one. Again they were puzzled, and passed the rings from hand to hand, still without doing what was expected.
Dolly, Chirikov, and Stepan Arkadyevich stepped forward to set them right. There was an interval of hesitation, whispering, and smiles;but the expression of solemn emotion on the faces of the betrothed pair did not change: on the contrary, in their perplexity over their hands they looked more grave and deeply moved than before, and the smile with which Stepan Arkadyevich whispered to them that now they would each put on their own ring died away on his lips. He had a feeling that any smile would jar on them.
`Thou who didst from the beginning create male and female,' the priest read after the exchange of rings, `from Thee woman was given to man to be a helpmeet to him, and for the procreation of children. O Lord, our God, who hast poured down the blessings of Thy Truth according to Thy Holy Covenant upon Thy chosen servants, our fathers, from generation to generation, bless Thy servants Konstantin and Ekaterina, and make their troth fast in faith, and union of hearts, and in truth, and in love....'
Levin felt more and more that all his ideas of marriage, all his dreams of how he would order his life, were mere childishness, and that it was something he had not understood hitherto, and now understood less than ever, though it was being performed upon him. The lump in his throat rose higher and higher; tears that would not be checked came into his eyes.
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TOLSTOY: Anna Karenina Part 5, Chapter 05[Previous Chapter] [Table of Contents] Chapter 5 In the church there was all Moscow, all the friends and relations; and during the ceremony of plighting troth, in the brilliantly lighted church, there was an incessant flow of discreetly subdued talk in the circle of gaily dressed women and girls, and men in white ties, evening dress, and uniform. The talk was principally kept up by the men, while the women were absorbed in watching every detail of the ceremony, which always touches them so much.
In the little group nearest the bride were her two sisters: Dolly, and the younger one, the self-possessed beauty, Madame Lvova, who had just arrived from abroad.
`Why is it Marie's in lilac? It's as bad as black at a wedding,'
said Madame Korsunskaia.
`With her complexion, it's her one salvation,' responded Madame Drubetskaia. `I wonder why they had the wedding in the evening? It's like shop people....'
`So much prettier. I was married in the evening too....' answered Madame Korsunskaia, and she sighed, remembering how charming she had been that day, and how absurdly in love her husband was, and how different it all was now.
`They say if anyone is best man more than ten times, he'll never be married. I wanted to be one for the tenth time, but the post was taken,'
said Count Siniavin to the pretty Princess Charskaia, who had designs on him.
Princess Charskaia only answered with a smile. She looked at Kitty, thinking how and when she would stand with Count Siniavin in Kitty's place, and how she would remind him then of his joke today.
Shcherbatsky told the old Hoffraulein, Madame Nikoleva, that he meant to put the crown on Kitty's chignon for luck.
`She ought not to have worn a chignon,' answered Madame Nikoleva, who had long ago made up her mind that if the elderly widower she was angling for married her, the wedding should be of the simplest. `I don't like such faste.'
Sergei Ivanovich was talking to Darya Dmitrievna, jestingly assuring her that the custom of going away after the wedding was becoming common because newly married people always felt a little ashamed of themselves.
`Your brother may feel proud of himself. She's a marvel of sweetness.
I believe you're envious.'
`Oh, I've got over that, Darya Dmitrievna,' he answered, and a melancholy and serious expression suddenly came over his face.
Stepan Arkadyevich was telling his sister-in-law his joke about divorce.
`The wreath wants setting straight,' she answered, without listening to him.
`What a pity she's lost her looks so,' Countess Nordstone said to Madame Lvova. `Still, he's not worth her little finger, is he?'
`Oh, I like him so - not because he's my future beau-frere,' answered Madame Lvova. `And how well he's behaving! It's so difficult, too, to look well in such a position, not to be ridiculous. And he's not ridiculous, and not affected; one can see he's moved.'
`You expected it, I suppose?'
`Almost. She always cared for him.'
`Well, we shall see which of them will step on the rug first.
I warned Kitty.'
`It will make no difference,' said Madame Lvova, `we're all obedient wives; it's in our family.'
`Oh, I stepped on the rug before Vassilii on purpose. And you, Dolly?'
Dolly stood beside them; she heard them, but she did not answer.
She was deeply moved. The tears stood in her eyes, and she could not have spoken without crying. She was rejoicing over Kitty and Levin; going back in thought to her own wedding, she glanced at the radiant figure of Stepan Arkadyevich, forgot all the present, and remembered only her own innocent love. She recalled not herself only, but all her women friends and acquaintances.
She thought of them on the one day of their triumph, when they had stood like Kitty under the wedding crown, with love and hope and dread in their hearts, renouncing the past, and stepping forward into the mysterious future.
Among the brides that came back to her memory, she thought too of her darling Anna, of whose proposed divorce she had just been hearing. And she had stood just as innocent, in orange blossoms and bridal veil. And now? `It's terribly strange,' she said to herself.
