Egyptians, and became a mingled race, having all the idleness and
predatory habits of their Eastern ancestors, with a ferocity which
they probably borrowed from the men of the north who joined their
society. They travelled in different bands, and had rules among
themselves, by which each tribe was confined to its own district.
The slightest invasion of the precincts which had been assigned to
another tribe produced desperate skirmishes, in which there was
often much blood shed.

The patriotic Fletcher of Saltoun drew a picture of these banditti
about a century ago, which my readers will peruse with
astonishment:--

'There are at this day in Scotland (besides a great many poor
families very meanly provided for by the church boxes, with others
who, by living on bad food, fall into various diseases) two
hundred thousand people begging from door to door. These are not
only no way advantageous, but a very grievous burden to so poor a
country. And though the number of them be perhaps double to what
it was formerly, by reason of this present great distress, yet in
all times there have been about one hundred thousand of those
vagabonds, who have lived without any regard or subjection either
to the laws of the land or even those of God and nature ... No
magistrate could ever discover, or be informed, which way one in a
hundred of these wretches died, or that ever they were baptized.
Many murders have been discovered among them; and they are not
only a most unspeakable oppression to poor tenants (who, if they
give not bread or some kind of provision to perhaps forty such
villains in one day, are sure to be insulted by them), but they
rob many poor people who live in houses distant from any