Leprosy is not properly an infectious complaint, in spite of the horror
in which the Cagot furniture, and the cloth woven by them, are held in
some places; the disorder is hereditary, and hence (say this body of wise
men, who have troubled themselves to account for the origin of Cagoterie)
the reasonableness and the justice of preventing any mixed marriages, by
which this terrible tendency to leprous complaints might be spread far
and wide. Another authority says, that though the Cagots are
fine-looking men, hard-working, and good mechanics, yet they bear in
their faces, and show in their actions, reasons for the detestation in
which they are held: their glance, if you meet it, is the jettatura, or
evil-eye, and they are spiteful, and cruel, and deceitful above all other
men. All these qualities they derive from their ancestor Gehazi, the
servant of Elisha, together with their tendency to leprosy.

Again, it is said that they are descended from the Arian Goths who were
permitted to live in certain places in Guienne and Languedoc, after their
defeat by King Clovis, on condition that they abjured their heresy, and
kept themselves separate from all other men for ever. The principal
reason alleged in support of this supposition of their Gothic descent, is
the specious one of derivation,--Chiens Gots, Cans Gets, Cagots,
equivalent to Dogs of Goths.

Again, they were thought to be Saracens, coming from Syria. In
confirmation of this idea, was the belief that all Cagots were possessed
by a horrible smell. The Lombards, also, were an unfragrant race, or so
reputed among the Italians: witness Pope Stephen's letter to Charlemagne,
dissuading him from marrying Bertha, daughter of Didier, King of
Lombardy. The Lombards boasted of Eastern descent, and were noisome. The
Cagots were noisome, and therefore must be of Eastern descent. What
could be clearer? In addition, there was the proof to be derived from