And prominent upon it, and indeed
for a time quite dominating it, was a Russian named Karenin, who was
singular in being a congenital cripple. His body was bent so that he
walked with difficulty, suffered much pain as he grew older, and had
at last to undergo two operations. The second killed him. Already
malformation, which was to be seen in every crowd during the middle ages
so that the crippled beggar was, as it were, an essential feature of
the human spectacle, was becoming a strange thing in the world. It had a
curious effect upon Karenin's colleagues; their feeling towards him was
mingled with pity and a sense of inhumanity that it needed usage rather
than reason to overcome. He had a strong face, with little bright brown
eyes rather deeply sunken and a large resolute thin-lipped mouth. His
skin was very yellow and wrinkled, and his hair iron gray. He was at all
times an impatient and sometimes an angry man, but this was forgiven him
because of the hot wire of suffering that was manifestly thrust through
his being. At the end of his life his personal prestige was very great.
To him far more than to any contemporary is it due that self-abnegation,
self-identification with the world spirit, was made the basis of
universal education. That general memorandum to the teachers which is
the key-note of the modern educational system, was probably entirely his
work.
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