The palace is decorated in _grafite_, and on a line with the arms are the favourite emblems of the Duke, a capricorn, a tortoise with a sail and two crossed anchors. It has always been attributed to Bartolomeo Ammanati, though neither Baldinucci nor any other contemporary writers give the name of the architect. But as Ammanati was at that time (1566–1569) engaged in rebuilding the bridge of Sta. Trinita, and was Cosimo’s favourite architect (he built the courtyard of Palazzo Pitti), it is more than probable that he was also employed by his courtiers. When Cosimo I. instituted the order of S. Stefano Don Antonio Ramirez di Montalvo was one of the first knights created, and was given a rich _Commenda_ in perpetuity. The name of his grand-daughter, Donna Leonora, is well-known in Florence as the foundress of the convent of Le Quiete, the great school where the daughters of the nobility are educated by nuns called the Signore della Quiete, all ladies of good birth who do not take solemn vows. The life of Donna Leonora, written in 1740, is curious reading. As a baby she reproved her nurse if she was idle, and as a girl she must have been a trial to her father confessor from her scruples and incessant fears that everything was a deadly sin. She had visions, during which Our Lord and the Virgin Mary talked with her; she predicted the restoration to health, or the death, of many people and performed many miraculous cures. A singular mixture of Spanish bigotry and Tuscan common-sense was Donna Leonora. Many of the rules she laid down for the teaching of the young ladies at Le Quiete would be considered admirable at the present day. “Let them be trained to order,” she writes, “and to cleanliness. Teach them to put away their clothes properly.... Let them not be lazy or negligent, but sprightly and diligent. They should know how to sweep and clean a room, how to make a bed, to take charge of the linen and woollen things, and of what pertains to the furniture of the house. They should learn how to nurse a sick person with care, according to the doctor’s orders, and how to prepare all kinds of milk dishes, cordials, candied fruit and sweet pastry. It would be well, too, that they should know how to sew and wash fine linen, such as is used in a sacristy. Not that they are to perform such fatiguing duties, save for exercise and their own pleasure; on the contrary, I desire that they should be served in seemly fashion, but so that in case of necessity they may be able to direct how things ought to be done, for that is most necessary for the good ruling of a household.”[50] After all these excellent, but rather commonplace, precepts, the bewildered reader is suddenly plunged into chapter after chapter of prophecies made, and miracles worked, by Donna Leonora; the miracles continued even after her death in 1659. She did, however, good work in founding the convent of the Signore della Quiete.