It must not be supposed that these maritime tribes were the only ones that would be found spreading abroad. The members of the various tribes did not strictly confine themselves to the boundaries assigned their tribe by Joshua, but they intermingled for trade, etc., and many men of other tribes resided within the borders of Judah's inheritance, and _vice versa_. We have a notable example of this (B. C. 600) in the case of Lehi and Laban, who were of the seed of Joseph, yet were residents of Jerusalem, and Nephi incidentally remarks that his father, Lehi, had dwelt in that city "all his days." The children of Ephraim, from their great enterprise and force of character, seem to have early spread, not only among other tribes, but also into foreign nations, notably to Egypt, and the anger of the Lord is repeatedly expressed through His prophets at His people's disregard of His law in mixing with the heathen. In Isaiah's time, Ephraim had, like a "silly dove," mingled himself among the people to the displeasure of his God. But it was not only for trade and commerce that Israel spread abroad; her children were sometimes forced to foreign lands against their will. Two hundred years before Lehi left Jerusalem, the Lord upbraided Tyre and Sidon through Joel his servant (_Joel iii: 6_), telling them, among other things, "The children also of Judah, and the children of Jerusalem have ye sold unto the Grecians" [or Gentiles], "that ye might remove them far from their border." Here we obtain a glimpse of the policy of these two cities; they sought to weaken Israel by deporting her children as captives to other nations afar off, and with true commercial instincts endeavored to make the transaction a profitable one. And if Judah and Jerusalem, at the other end of the land, thus suffered at the hands of Tyre and her sister city, is it not a certainty that other tribes, living nearer, would suffer from this same cause, and probably more severely? We are of the opinion that this wholesale slave trade of the Phœnicians is greatly under-estimated as a factor in the diffusion of Israelitish blood throughout the world. So great was the number of slaves held by these people, that at one time in their chief city, the slaves exceeded the freemen in number, and their maritime enterprise was such that they established colonies or depots on all the islands of the Mediterranean Sea, in France, Spain, Italy, Britain, and probably in Germany. The whole coast of northern Africa was studded with their colonies, which they carried south as far as Timbuctoo and the Niger, while by way of the Red Sea they reached eastern Africa, Persia, India, and some suppose China; in fact, they traded with, and established colonies all over the then known world.[B]