magne. That great lawmaker had endeavored to banish
from his capital all public women, but they defied even his imperial
authority. He ordained that they should be punished with the lash, and
that all those who had lodged them, or had been found in their company,
should carry them around their necks to the place of execution. But the
number of these whippings, and of these singular processions, was so
great that a policy of toleration was, perforce, substituted.
Philippe-Auguste also undertook to regulate this disorder, as the number
was constantly increasing of these _femmes amoureuses_, or _filles
folles_, as they were called; they were grouped in a corporation,
honored with a special tax, and with special judges to consider their
delinquencies; they were given the liberty of certain streets, the names
of which have been preserved, in each of which they were furnished with
a building (_clapier_, a sort of hutch, or retreat), which they were to
keep clean and "render agreeable and comfortable." Here they were to
confine themselves from ten o'clock in the morning till curfew--six
o'clock in the evening in winter, and between eight and nine in summer,
and nowhere else whatever. Every year they walked in solemn procession
on the day of Saint Mary Magdalen. "Those of them who followed the
Court were obliged during the month of May to furnish the bed of the
_roi des ribauds_."

[Illustration: THE CRYING EVIL. WOMAN OF THE PEOPLE CARRYING THE CHURCH
AND THE STATE.

Reproduction of one of many contemporary engravings issued to excite the
people against the clergy and nobility.]

This functionary had been established by Philippe-Auguste for the double
purpose of policing these offenders, and of forming a body-guard of
resolute men for the monarch himself. "The ribauds were armed with
maces, and watched night and day over the person of the king, who feared
the assassins of the Old Man of the Mountain and the bravoes of Richard
of England. The _roi des ribauds_ was an important personage, in the
enjoyment of very considerable prerogatives and privileges. He mounted
guard at the sovereign's door, and saw that no one entered without
authority. He was the judge for crimes committed within the enclosure of
the royal residence, and carried out himself the sentences which he
pronounced; he was thus at once judge and executioner. We find him in
the exercise of his office as late as the fifteenth century."

Under Saint Louis, there