ostern gate into the moat, thence to a terrace by which he reached a
bridge leading into the park. This park had twelve gates, and he had the
keys of all. He mounted a blood horse which he had left waiting behind a
wall, and started off at full gallop. The same day he passed through
the village of Escherolles, a league distant from Saint-Geran, where
he stopped at the house of a nurse, wife of a glove-maker named Claude.
This peasant woman gave her breast to the child; but the steward, not
daring to stay in a village so near Saint-Geran, crossed the river
Allier at the port de la Chaise, and calling at the house of a man named
Boucaud, the good wife suckled the child for the second time; he then
continued his journey in the direction of Auvergne.

The heat was excessive, his horse was done up, the child seemed uneasy.
A carrier's cart passed him going to Riom; it was owned by a certain
Paul Boithion of the town of Aigueperce, a common carrier on the road.
Baulieu went alongside to put the child in the cart, which he entered
himself, carrying the infant on his knees. The horse followed, fastened
by the bridle to the back of the cart.

In the conversation which he held with this man, Baulieu said that he
should not take so much care of the child did it not belong to the
most noble house in the Bourbonnais. They reached the village of Che at
midday. The mistress of the house where he put up, who was nursing
an infant, consented to give some of her milk to the child. The poor
creature was covered with blood; she warmed some water, stripped off its
swaddling linen, washed it from head to foot, and swathed it up again
more neatly.

The carrier then took them to Riom. When they got there, Baulieu got rid
of him by giving a false meeting-place for their departure; left in
the direction of the abbey of Lavoine, and reached the village
of Descoutoux, in the mountains, between Lavoine and Thiers. The
Marchioness de Bouille had a chateau there where she occasionally spent
some time.

The child was nursed at Descoutoux by Gabrielle Moini, who was paid
a month in advance; but she only kept it a week or so, because they
refused to tell her the father and mother and to refer her to a place
where she might send reports of her charge. This woman having made these
reasons public, no nurse could be found to take charge of the child,
which was removed from the village of Descoutoux. The persons who
removed it took the highroad to Burgun