The after effects of Levin's evening on the haycock destroy his pleasure as a squire and make him dissatisfied with farming. He is additionally annoyed because Kitty is spending the summer merely twenty miles away. Seeking a change, Levin visits his friend Sviazhsky who lives in a remote part of the district with splendid snipe marshes nearby.
Although the hunting is poor, Levin's discussions with Sviazhsky and another guest about the state of the Russian peasant and the inefficient use of the land inspire him to devise a new system of agriculture. After a few days, he hastens home to put his plan into action. Levin wants to increase the peasants' interest in the success of their work, even if it means, temporarily, that new methods and new machinery be sacrificed. He plans that he and the peasants work as shareholders in the estate. One stumbling-block is that summer farming is in full swing. Another is the insurmountable distrust of the peasants; they cannot believe that the master has any other aim than to squeeze all he can out of them. Some of the peasants grasp the idea of cooperative land plots and parts of the farm are divided accordingly, the rest of the estate remaining as before. Problems arise, of course, and some of the peasants do not put in the improvements they had agreed upon. These matters, along with managing the rest of the estate and writing a book on the subject occupy Levin until well in September.
