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his heel as he lifted it out of the mud seemed to Levin like the cry of the bird; he clutched and squeezed the butt of his gun.
Bang! Bang! A gun went off directly behind his ear.
It was Vasenka shooting at a flock of ducks which were splashing about in the swamp, and alighted far away from the huntsmen in an irregular line. Before Levin had a chance to glance round, a woodcock drummed,—another, a third, and half a dozen more flew up one after the other.
Stepan Arkadyevitch shot one at the very instant he was about beginning his zigzags, and the woodcock fell in a heap in the swamp. Oblonsky took his time in aiming at another which was flying low toward the high grass, and simultaneously with the flash the bird fell and it could be seen skipping from the mown grass, flapping its white uninjured wing.
Levin was not so fortunate; he shot at too close range for the first woodcock, and missed; he was about to follow after it, but just as it was rising again, another flew up from almost under him and diverted his attention, causing him to miss again.
While they were reloading, still another woodcock flew up, and Veslovsky, who had got his gun loaded first, fired two charges of small shot into the water. Stepan Arkadyevitch picked up his woodcock, and looked at Levin with flashing eyes.
"And now let us separate," said he, and limping with his left leg, and holding his gun ready cocked and whistling to his dog, he started off by himself. Levin and Veslovsky took the other direction.
It always happened with Levin that when his first shots were unsuccessful, he grew excited, lost his temper, and shot badly the rest of the day. So it was in the present instance. The woodcock were abundant; they kept flying up from before the dogs, and from under the huntsmen's feet, and Levin might have easily retrieved his fortunes; but the longer he hunted, the more he disgraced himself before Veslovsky, who kept mer-
