Diary of John Quincy Adams, volume 1
This afternoon I went with Mr. Artaud to Mr. Rimberts and from thence to the play. They represented Le Barbier de Seville and les trois freres rivaux.1 After the play we return'd and supped at Mr. Rimberts.
Beaumarchais, Le Barbier de Séville, ou la précaution inutile, Paris, 1775; Joseph de Lafont or La Font, Les trois frères rivaux, Paris, 1713 (Brenner, Bibliographical List
).
This forenoon I went round to see the fortress with Mr. Montréal Mr. Gummer and Mr. Artaud. Mr. Artaud dined and spent the evening at Mr. Rimberts.
This day I dined with Mr. D. and Mr. Artaud at Mr. Colombi's. After dinner I went to Mr. Rimberts. Mr. Artaud went to the Clubb.1
Between p. 84 and 85 of the Diary, there has been placed a loose drawing, approximately 3″ × 4″, of a female figure, presumably a Nereid, leaning on an anchor with a banner overhead reading “Meliora speramus.” The source of the drawing, presumably rendered by JQA, is not known.
This day the Count Greco, Mr. Gummer and Mr. Peyron dined here. In the evening I went with Mr. Artaud to Mr. Rimbert's; spent the evening and supped there.
This morning I went with Mr. Artaud to Mr. Rimberts and from thence we set out, eight in one large carriage and two other gentlemen in another small one for Czarsko-Zelo her Majesty's ordinary residence in the summer.1 Before we had got half ways the small carriage's axletree broke and we were obliged to take the two other gentlemen in; so that we went all ten in the same carriage. We arrived there at about 12 o'clock and went directly to see the palace the inside of which is not yet wholly finished. After having seen the palace we return'd into the city and arriv'd at about half past seven o'clock; and returned to our sev-153eral destinations. Czarsko-Zelo is distant from Petersbourg 22 wersts.
The famous summer residence of Catherine the Great at Tsarkoe Selo (renamed Pushkin), located about fifteen miles south of St. Petersburg, was originally a residence of Catherine I. About 1750 it was enlarged and embellished for the Empress Elizabeth in baroque style by the Italian architect Bartolommeo Rastrelli (1700–1771), but its completion and redecoration in neoclassical style was done for Catherine II by the Scottish architect Charles Cameron in the latter part of the century (Storch, Picture of Petersburg,
p. 74–78; John Parkinson, A Tour of Russia, Siberia and the Crimea 1792–1794, ed. William Collier, London, 1971, p. 253).