from ANNA KARENINA:
shameful and unforgivable: not keeping up with the pace of the horse, he let himself down into the saddle, and all at once his position shifted and he realized that something terrible had happened...Vronsky was touching the ground with one foot, and his horse was sinking on that foot. He barely managed to free his foot, when she fell on her side, snorting harshly, and, making vain efforts to rise with her slender sweating neck, she fluttered on the ground at his feet like a wounded bird.
The clumsy movement which Vronsky had made had broken her back.
But he realized this much later...And now he stood swaying on the dusty, unmoving ground; before him, panting deeply, lay Frou-Frou, and, bending her head back, she looked at him with her charming eyes. Not yet understanding what had happened, Vronsky tugged at the horse by the rains. She fluttered again like a fish, shaking the flaps of the saddle, and straightened out her front legs, but having no strength to pick up the rear, at once tangled herself up and again
fell on her side.
With a pale face, disfigured by passion and with his lower jaw trembling, Vronsky kicked her in the stomach with his heel and again started tugging at the rains.
She did not stir, but burying her nose in the ground, only stared at her master with her expressive eyes.
"Aaa!" groaned Vronsky, clutching his head, "Ah, what have I done," he cried. "The race is lost! And it's my own fault, shameful, unforgivable!
And this poor, dear, ruined horse! ... What have I done?"
For the first time in his life he experienced the most extreme misery, an irredeemable misery, and one for which he was himself responsible.
Part II, Chapter XXVI
shameful and unforgivable: not keeping up with the pace of the horse, he let himself down into the saddle, and all at once his position shifted and he realized that something terrible had happened...Vronsky was touching the ground with one foot, and his horse was sinking on that foot. He barely managed to free his foot, when she fell on her side, snorting harshly, and, making vain efforts to rise with her slender sweating neck, she fluttered on the ground at his feet like a wounded bird.
The clumsy movement which Vronsky had made had broken her back.
But he realized this much later...And now he stood swaying on the dusty, unmoving ground; before him, panting deeply, lay Frou-Frou, and, bending her head back, she looked at him with her charming eyes. Not yet understanding what had happened, Vronsky tugged at the horse by the rains. She fluttered again like a fish, shaking the flaps of the saddle, and straightened out her front legs, but having no strength to pick up the rear, at once tangled herself up and again
fell on her side.
With a pale face, disfigured by passion and with his lower jaw trembling, Vronsky kicked her in the stomach with his heel and again started tugging at the rains.
She did not stir, but burying her nose in the ground, only stared at her master with her expressive eyes.
"Aaa!" groaned Vronsky, clutching his head, "Ah, what have I done," he cried. "The race is lost! And it's my own fault, shameful, unforgivable!
And this poor, dear, ruined horse! ... What have I done?"
For the first time in his life he experienced the most extreme misery, an irredeemable misery, and one for which he was himself responsible.
Part II, Chapter XXVI
