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it with gold. Their subjects were proud of it as marking
them out to be free men in contradistinction to the degene-
rate Roman population. Alaric touched the Beard of
Clovis as a solemn mode of confirming a treaty, and ac-
knowledging Clovis as his godfather. The Merovingian
Dynasty were Bearded. Then came Charlemagne who
swore by his Beard, as did Otho the Great and Barbarossa,
Emperors of Germany, after him. The following story
shows the faith of those early times in the sacredness of
this form of adjuration. A peasant, who had sworn a
false oath on the relics of two holy Martyrs, having taken
hold of his Beard, as further confirmation, heaven to
punish him, caused the whole to come off in his hand!
Charlemagne also enacted that any one who should
call another red-beard or red-fox, should pay a heavy fine;
a law explained by a prejudice embodied in two German
proverbs.*
Of red-bea,rd no good heard
Red beard—a knave to be feared;
and carried to its climax in the anecdote of a Spanish
nobleman, who, having accused a man of some crime,
and the latter being proved innocent, exclaimed, " if he
did not do it he was plotting it, for the rascal has a
red beard!" Those who need consolation under this
Rothbart nie gut wart
Rotbbart Schelmen art
