Page:The Lay of the Last Minstrel - Scott (1805).djvu/224

 1. "Original. I conceive them the same called Borderers in Mr Cambden; and characterised by him to be, a wild and warlike people. They are called Moss-troopers, because dwelling in the mosses, and riding in troops together. They dwell in the bounds, or meeting, of two kingdoms, but obey the laws of neither. They come to church as seldom as the 29th of February comes into the kalendar.

2. "Increase. When England and Scotland were united in Great Britain, they that formerly lived by hostile incursions, betook themselves to the robbing of their neighbours. Their sons are free of the trade by their fathers' copy. They are like to Job, not in piety and patience, but in suddain plenty and poverty; sometimes having flocks and herds in the morning, none at night, and perchance many again next day. They may give for their mottoe, vivitur ex rapto, stealing from their honest neighbours what they sometimes require. They are a nest of hornets; strike one, and stir all of them about your ears. Indeed, if they promise safely to conduct a traveller, they will perform it with the fidelity of a Turkish Janizary; otherwise, wo be to him that falleth into their quarters!

3. "Height. Amounting forty years since to some thousands. These compelled the vicenage to purchase their security, by paying a constant rent to them. When in their greatest height, they had two great enemies, the laws of the land, and the Lord William Howard of Naworth. He sent many of them to Carlisle, to that place, where the officer always doth his work by day-light. Yet these Moss-troopers, if possibly they could procure the pardon for a condemned person of