Page:A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country (1804).djvu/188

174 and, having ordered her to be brought before him, at the head of his army, reproached her, in the most indecent manner, with all the crimes that had been committed by his mother Fredegonde and himself: the troops, inflamed by this, called loudly for her death. During three days, she was exposed to their derision and insult, mounted on a camel, and paraded round the camp; on the fourth, she was tied to the tail of a horse, that had never been broken, and dashed to pieces on the ground; what remained of her body was thrown into the flames.

Authors are divided upon her character; some have drawn it as most vile; but the more respectable represent her as the perfect model of beauty and the graces, as a pattern of decency, wisdom, virtue, and meekness. Pope Gregory praises her as a princess ever attentive to the discharge of religious duties, a virtuous regent, and good mother; and her reign, notwithstanding all the detraction of calumny, has many instances of generosity, sense, firmness, and benevolence. There were, in after times, so many proofs of her public spirit remaining in castles, churches, monasteries, hospitals, and high roads, as almost to render it incredible they had been performed by the single monarch of a small part of France. Gifford's History of France.

, from her childhood, instructed in literature, and profited so well by her studies, that she acquired the