The Duke purchased a country estate at St. Leu, and here the boys made experiments in chemistry, studied botany, practised gardening, carpentry, and other forms of handwork. But Madame de Genlis did more than play the part of Rousseau with three Emiles. She handed on to her pupils the delights of her own childhood. These boys could laugh at Emile marooned in his island. They played out a dozen different Voyages in the park of St. Leu; and had a theatre of their own in which they acted moral plays from the _Théâtre d’Education_.[82]