they are harmful or useful. And most of them are harmful, especially the women. Yes, dear boy,” he continued, “I have met loving, noble, high-minded men, but I have not yet met any women—countesses or cooks—who were not venal. I have not yet met that divine purity and devotion I look for in women. If I found such a one I’d give my life for her! But those! …” and he made a gesture of contempt. “And believe me, if I still value my life it is only because I still hope to meet such a divine creature, who will regenerate, purify, and elevate me. But you don’t understand it.”
“Oh, yes, I quite understand,” answered Rostóv, who was under his new friend’s influence.
In the autumn the Rostóvs returned to Moscow. Early in the winter Denísov also came back and stayed with them.
The first half of the winter of 1806, which Nikoláy Rostóv spent in Moscow, was one of the happiest, merriest times for him and the whole family.
Nikoláy brought many young men to his parents’ house.
- Véra was a handsome girl of twenty;
- Sónya a girl of sixteen with all the charm of an opening flower;
- Natásha, half grown up and half child, was now childishly amusing, now girlishly enchanting.
At that time in the Rostóvs’ house there prevailed an amorous atmosphere characteristic of homes where there are very young and very charming girls. Every young man who came to the house—seeing those impressionable, smiling young faces (smiling probably at their own happiness), feeling the eager bustle around him, and hearing the fitful bursts of song and music and the inconsequent but friendly prattle