18. Caesaries prolixa . . . crinium flagellis per terga
dismissis, etc. See the Preface to the third volume of the
Historians of France and the Abbe Le Boeuf (Dissertat. tom.
iii. p. 47-79). This peculiar fashion of the Merovingians
has been remarked by natives and strangers; by Priscus (tom.
i. p. 608 [p. 152, ed. Bonn]), by Agathias (tom. ii. p. 49
[l. i. c. 3, p. 19, ed. Bonn]), and by Gregory of Tours (l.
iii. 18, vi. 24, viii. 10, tom. ii. p. 196, 278, 316).