The herdsman ran gaily to get ready for the meadow.

The cowherd girls, picking up their petticoats, ran splashing through the mud with bare legs, still white, not yet brown from the sun, waving brush wood in their hands, chasing the calves that frolicked in the mirth of spring.

After admiring the young ones of that year, who were particularly fine--the early calves were the size of a peasant's cow, and Pava's daughter, at three months old, was as big as a yearling-- Levin gave orders for a trough to be brought out and for them to be fed in the paddock.