Note 17 — An Incident of the Baptism.
Reading edition
It was a mediæval superstition, especially in France, that the English possessed tails, which had been affixed to their persons as a punishment for their ill-treatment of a saint; the names of St. Augustine and St. Thomas of Canterbury were used indifferently in this connection. Cf. Mr. George Neilson's "Caudatus Anglicus: A Mediæval Slander."