The new book by the famous writer and historian Olga Eliseeva is dedicated to the daily life of the Russian nobility of the golden age of Catherine II. Talking about the lives of nobles and old-world landowners, the empress herself and visiting travelers, the author tried to show not only their handkerchiefs, candles and dirty wheels road carriages, but also how our ancestors breathed, felt, loved and hated in that glorious, already distant, but still attractive time. To solve such a problem, there is no better way than to give the reader the opportunity to touch the original documents of the era. That is why such an important place in the book is occupied by texts created two centuries ago: memoirs, correspondence, political pamphlets, reports, etc.