Note 669 — Chapter VI · (continued 2)

According to William of Malmesbury (Gest. Pont. 274), he first behaved well for fear of Saint Cuthberht, but finding that some smaller misdeeds went unpunished, he presently ventured on greater. But in the existing text he mentions only that Flambard dragged criminals out of sanctuary, “ausus scelus omnibus retro annis inauditum.” William had written, but he found it expedient to strike out, how the Bishop not only set forbidden food before his monks, but, “ut magis religionem irritaret, puellas speciosissimas quæ essent procatioris formæ et faciei eis propinare juberet, strictis ad corpus vestibus, solutis in terga crinibus.”