CHAPTER EIGHT.
AT THE PREPARATORY SCHOOL.
The Bonaparte boys and their father stopped a while in Florence, so that Charles Bonaparte could procure the proper papers to prove that he was of what is called noble birth.

For it seems that only the children of nobles could enter the French military school at Brienne.
He procured these at last, and also a letter of introduction to the French queen, Marie Antoinette whose sad story you all know so well.
Then they set out for Autun, and reached that quaint old town on the last day of the year 1778.

On New Year's Day, 1779, Napoleon was entered as a pupil in the preparatory school at Autun.
Autun has been a school town tor hundreds of years.

The old Druids had a school there, and so did the Romans.

It is one of the oldest of French towns; and you will find it on your map of France, about one hundred and fifty miles south-east of Paris.