Immediately thereafter were appointed for him seventeen
thousand, nine hundred, and thirteen cows of the towns
of Pautille and Brehemond, to furnish him with milk
in ordinary, for it was impossible to find a nurse
sufficient for him in all the country, considering
the great quantity of milk that was requisite for
his nourishment; although there were not wanting some
doctors of the opinion of Scotus, who affirmed that
his own mother gave him suck, and that she could draw
out of her breasts one thousand, four hundred, two
pipes, and nine pails of milk at every time.
Which indeed is not probable, and this point hath
been found duggishly scandalous and offensive to tender
ears, for that it savoured a little of heresy.
Thus was he handled for one year and ten months; after
which time, by the advice of physicians, they began
to carry him, and then was made for him a fine little
cart drawn with oxen, of the invention of Jan Denio,
wherein they led him hither and thither with great
joy; and he was worth the seeing, for he was a fine
boy, had a burly physiognomy, and almost ten chins.
He cried very little, but beshit himself every hour:
for, to speak truly of him, he was wonderfully phlegmatic
in his posteriors, both by reason of his natural complexion
and the accidental disposition which had befallen
him by his too much quaffing of the Septembral juice.
Yet without a cause did not he sup one drop; for
if he happened to be vexed, angry, displeased, or
sorry, if he did fret, if he did weep, if he did cry,
and what grievous quarter soever he kept, in bringing
him some drink, he would be instantly pacified, reseated
in his own temper, in a good humour again, and as
still and quiet as ever. One of his governesses
told me (swearing by her fig), how he was so accustomed
to this kind of way, that, at the sound of pints and
flagons, he would on a sudden fall into an ecstasy,
as if he had then tasted of the joys of paradise;
so that they, upon consideration of this, his divine
complexion, would every morning, to cheer him up,
play with a knife upon the glasses, on the bottles
with their stopples, and on the pottle-pots with their
lids and covers, at the sound whereof he became gay,
did leap for joy, would loll and rock himself in the
cradle, then nod with his head, monochordizing with
his fingers, and barytonizing with his tail.
Chapter 1.VIII.
How they apparelled Gargantua.
Being of this age, his father ordained to have clothes
made to him in his own livery, which was white and
blue. To work then went the tailors, and with
great expedition were those clothes made, cut, and
sewed, according to the fashion that was then in request.
I find by the ancient records or pancarts, to be
seen in the chamber of accounts, or court of the exchequer
at Montsoreau, that he was accoutred in manner as followeth.
To make him every shirt of his were taken up nine
hundred ells of Chasteleraud linen, and two hundred
