“On a sultry, clear July day in 1768, along Lugovaya Street (now Morskaya), which was adjacent to Nevsky Prospect in St. Petersburg, at one o’clock in the afternoon, a huge carriage of a very unprepossessing appearance was slowly moving. She trembled all over, creaked and rattled the nuts with every push; it seemed that the antediluvian carriage was about to fall apart; Some ropes and straps could be seen everywhere. At the top of it were piles of chests, caskets and baskets of various shapes; behind, on a special wicker seat that looked like a bag of ropes, sat a boy of about fifteen and, with his mouth open, looked around...”