"She had the head of a man on the shoulders of a woman. Left without a guide or protector, she was obliged to assume the management of affairs, but the burden did not overcome her. She administered every thing with a degree of sagacity not to be expected from her age or sex. Her tenderness was joined with severity. She punished, rewarded all alike. The good, the bad, nothing escaped her. Ah, what a woman! where shall we look for her equal? She watched over us with a solicitude unexampled. Every low sentiment, every ungenerous affection was discouraged and discarded. She suffered nothing but that which was grand and elevated to take root in our youthful understandings. She abhorred falsehood, and would not tolerate the slightest act of disobedience. None of our faults were overlooked. Losses, privations, fatigue had no effect upon her. She endured all, braved all. She had the energy of a man combined with the gentleness and delicacy of a woman." Madame Permon, mother of the Duchess of Abrantes, a Corsican lady of fortune who resided at Montpellier, immediately after the death of Charles Bonaparte, took Joseph, the orphan boy, into her house. Madame Permon and Letitia Raniolini had been companions and intimate friends in their youthful days. "She was to me," says Joseph, "an angel of consolation; and she lavished upon me all the attentions I could have received from the most tender and affectionate of mothers." Joseph soon returned to Corsica. Napoleon had just before been promoted to the military school in Paris, in which city Eliza still continued at school. Lucien, the next younger brother, had also now been taken to the Continent, where he was pursuing his education. The four remaining children were very young. "My mother," says Joseph, "moderated the expression of her grief that she might not excite mine. Heroic and admirable woman! the model of mothers; how much thy children are indebted to thee for the example which thou hast given them!"