In the five months spent in Paris before the 13th Vendémiaire, Bonaparte saw something of society. One interesting company which he often joined, was that gathered about Madame Permon at a hotel in the Rue des Filles Saint-Thomas. This Madame Permon was the same with whom he had taken refuge frequently in the days when he was in the military school of Paris, and whom he had visited later, in 1792, when lingering in town with hope of recovering his place in the army. On this latter occasion he had even exposed himself to aid her and her husband to escape the fury of the Terrorists and to fly from the city. Madame Permon had returned to Paris in the spring of 1795 for a few weeks, and numbers of her old friends had gathered about her as before the Terror, among them, Bonaparte. Another house—and one of very different character—at which he was received, was that of Barras. The 9th Thermidor, as the fall of Robespierre is called, released Paris from a strain of terror so great that, in reaction, she plunged for a time into violent excess. In this period of decadence Barras was sovereign. Epicurean by nature, possessing the tastes, culture, and vices of the old _régime_, he was better fitted than any man in the government to create and direct a dissolute and luxurious society. Into this set Napoleon was introduced, and more than once he expressed his astonishment to Joseph at the turn things had taken in Paris. “The pleasure-seekers have reappeared, and forget, or, rather, remember only as a dream, that they ever ceased to shine. Libraries are open, and lectures on history, chemistry, astronomy, etc., succeed each other. Everything is done to amuse and make life agreeable. One has no time to think; and how can one be gloomy in this busy whirlwind? Women are everywhere—at the theatres, on the promenades, in the libraries. In the study of the _savant_ you meet some that are charming. Here alone, of all places in the world, they deserve to hold the helm. The men are mad over them, think only of them, live only by and for them. A woman need not stay more than six months in Paris to learn what is due her and what is her empire.... This great nation has given itself up to pleasure, dancing, and theatres, and women have become the principal occupation. Ease, luxury, and _bon ton_ have recovered their throne; the Terror is remembered only as a dream.” Bonaparte took his part in the gayeties of his new friends, and was soon on easy terms with most of the women who frequented the _salon_ of Barras, even with the most influential of them all, the famous Madame Tallien, the great beauty of the Directory.