The ass’s milk was offered to the child in the bottle. Little Chérubin drank it without objection, for he had an excellent disposition; he accepted whatever was offered him, so that the important thing was to offer him what would be good for him.
This system of nourishment was continued for several days. The marquis gave his son wine to drink and madame gave him ass’s milk. The child was very red when he left his father’s hands, but he became very pale again with his mother. They soon discovered that the dear boy was out of order, and stout Turlurette added the syringe to all the other remedies; and Jasmin, determined at all risks to fatten the little Grandvilain, gave him a piece of pie crust, or a slice of sausage, as soon as he was left alone with him.
Before little Chérubin had been on this diet of ass’s milk, pie crust and syringes a month, instead of growing fat, he was in a shocking condition. The marchioness wept, and Monsieur de Grandvilain decided to send for a doctor. After examining the child and learning all that they had been doing to nourish him, the doctor exclaimed in a very severe tone:
“Allow me to inform you that, if you go on like this, in a week you will not have any child.”
The marchioness sobbed, the marquis turned green, and they both cried in one breath:
“What must we do, doctor, to restore our child’s health?”
“What must you do? Why give him a nurse, a good nurse, and send him into the country with her, and leave him there a long while, a very long while; that’s what you must do, and at once, this very day; you have no time to waste if you want to preserve the life of this child.”
The tone in which the doctor spoke admitted no reply; luckily their love for the child was above all self-esteem, so they were fain to agree that they had done wrong, and to obey in all haste.
The marquis sent all his people in search of a nurse. The marchioness herself went about among her acquaintances, asking for information and advice; but the time passed, and those who were well recommended could not be obtained at once. As evening approached, they had not succeeded in finding a nurse; the marchioness and her husband embraced their child and had no idea what to give him, as they dared not continue to feed him as they had been doing.
Suddenly Jasmin appeared with a fresh, buxom, red-cheeked peasant woman, exclaiming: