The first part of the book, written by P., is on the aristocratic Spain and urban Holland. The second one, prepared by P.N. Antsiferov, is on the French society in the epoch of Absolutism. P. noted that an excursion into the history of Western Europe can be built successfully only at the museum exhibits – in the absence of any possibility of a trip to Europe. For this, you can use painting, sculpture, pieces of applied art. He declared that when describing a work of art, it is important to take into account the “artistic task embodied in the picture”, as well as to stress the specifics of the artist's image of earlier eras. Briullov and ‘The Destruction of Pompeii’ were mentioned as an example. In the author’s opinion, it is important to pay attention to the connection between the artist and his epoch. The excursion he prepared was based on the opposition of ‘militant Catholicism’ and monarchy to the ‘masses of people’ – represented with the population of Holland. The tour touches upon the economic and social structure of society, leaving aside the Counter-Reformation. P. emphasized the absence of city views and the predominance of religious themes or portraits in Spanish painting of that time. Opposing Spanish and Dutch painting, P. emphasizes that the latter one is presented with ‘small paintings, full of warmth and light, designed to decorate family living rooms”. In this case, there is an opposition of the customer, since in Spanish paintings pieces of art were created mainly for nobility. The author mentioned 16 paintings by Spanish artists and 17 by Dutch masters for the tour.