58 THE BORDERERS. the other ; and have been prevailed upon to settle in the enemy's camp. To them it more frequently happens that they gradually forget all they learnt in their father's house, and insensibly adopt the manners of the strange Country, than that they bring over the other party to their side. It may, therefore, perhaps be safer not to contract these unholy alliances, till there is a conquest obtained by the small territory over the great one ; an event which, if we may judge by thepre- sent state of the parties, seems at a very considerable distance. But enough, and perhaps the scrupu- lous Christian will say, too much, of this light manner of treating a serious sub- ject. We acknowledge the charge ; we bow to the correction : confessing that we scarcely know how to approach this important and interesting class ofpersons, without the thin veil of something be- tween fiction and fact, between allegory and true history. We felt an almost
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