one of the elder ones said that it would be a great sin to shed the blood of their relative, and that it would be better to throw him into a pit and leave him there to die; to which suggestion the rest consented. When Joseph came up to them, they insulted him, and stripped him of the coat which his father, in his fondness for him, had made for him, and, unheeding the lad's cries and remonstrances, they threw him into a pit. After this cruel deed, the men went to their meal; and whilst eating it they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites, and to them they sold Joseph, who was taken out of the pit and given to them. The Ishmaelites, fearing that Joseph was not a slave, judging from his handsome face and noble carriage, sold him to a company of Midianites, merchants going down to Egypt. When these merchants arrived in Egypt, they sold him as a slave to an Egyptian nobleman. Here he was kindly treated by his master, who had confidence in his integrity, and was made an overseer of his master's property. Joseph was seventeen years old when he was taken away from his home and country, and his father mourned for him as dead. This took place in the year 1728 B.C.

The ways of the Almighty God are mysterious, and far above human comprehension. God blessed Joseph, and he grew into man's estate goodly and well-favoured.

His master's wife noticed him and became madly enamoured; losing all self-control, she made criminal advances to him, which he repelled, and entreated her to remember that he was her husband's trusted servant, and that she should not induce him

to commit such wickedness against his master and sin in the sight of God. She still persisted, till at last she used force, and he fled from her presence, leaving a piece of his coat by which she held him. Seeing that he was not to be overcome, she hated him, and, to revenge herself on him, she reversed the story and told it to her husband, who, believing her tale, became very angry with Joseph and prosecuted him. Though the Court wherein he was tried found him innocent, yet the nobleman persuaded the judge to place Joseph in confinement, that his wife's conduct might not be made public; and, as Joseph had neither friends nor means, he was helpless, and consequently was sent to prison, where he remained many years.

In his solitude, the mind of the captive must have often recalled scenes of home, and all the lessons that he had learnt orally-as was the custom in the East and remembered the great deeds and renown of his ancestors, and the marvellous acts of God towards Noah and Abraham and Isaac, and his own father Jacob, who was surnamed by God Israel. In regarding his miserable condition he must have thought of the visit to Egypt of his great-grandfather, Abraham, who came as a prince, and was treated by the king as his friend; and how the king, when he found he was misinformed by Abraham regarding his wife, made honourable amends, and gave him flocks and herds as presents; and when the famine in Canaan was over, he and his wife and their nephew left Egypt in state (the Egyptian historians call these visitors "Shepherd Kings"); and how when there was another famine in Canaan, in the lifetime of

Isaac, there was corn in Egypt, and Isaac would have visited Egypt as did his father, but that he was forbidden by God.

Thus time sped till Joseph was thirty years old, when Pharaoh, King of Egypt, was warned in dreams of the approach of the great and memorable famine, which was to last seven long years, during which time the earth would make its sabbath, and produce no food for man or beast. It was then that the unhappy captive was remembered by a fellowprisoner, whose dream Joseph had interpreted, and which was realised as he predicted; so that, when all the wise men of Egypt could not tell the King the meaning of his dreams, and when the King in his disappointed rage was about to condemn them to death, Joseph was called.

He was taken from the prison and brought before the King, who, seeing in him a superior deportment and a stately person, came down from his throne and addressed him as an equal; he told him his dreams, and said there was none who could interpret them, and that he had heard that he understood dreams and could interpret them. Joseph answered the King with humility, and told him what was the will of God regarding the land of Egypt; that there would be seven years of great plenty throughout all the land of Egypt, and after them seven years of famine; that all the plenty would be forgotten in the land of Egypt, and the famine would consume the land. Joseph advised Pharaoh to look out for a man discreet and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt; to appoint officers over the land, and to take up the fifth part of the produce of the land of

Egypt in the seven plenteous years; to let them gather all the food of those good years that were to come, and lay up corn under the hand of Pharaoh, and let them keep food in the cities, that it might be for store to the land against the seven years of famine which should be in the land of Egypt, that the land might not perish through the famine.

Pharaoh was greatly pleased, both at the interpretation and the advice; and, as there was none like him, in whom was the spirit of God, Pharaoh made Joseph the Viceroy of Egypt; and Pharaoh took off his ring from his hand and put it upon Joseph's hand, and arrayed him in vestures of fine linen, and put a gold chain about his neck; and he made him ride in the second chariot which he had, and the people cried before him, "Bow the knee!" or "Bend the knee !" and Pharaoh made him ruler of all the land of Egypt.

And Pharaoh said unto Joseph, "I am Pharaoh, and without thee shall no man lift up his hand or foot in all the land of Egypt." And Pharaoh called Joseph's name Zaphnath-paaneah, or "Preserver of the Age."

Consequently Joseph had absolute power vested in him. The King also gave him to wife Asenath, the daughter of Potipherah, priest of On. And Joseph went throughout all the land of Egypt. And in the seven plenteous years the earth brought forth by handfuls. And he gathered up all the food of the seven years, which were in the land of Egypt, and laid up the food in the cities; the food of the field, which was round about every city, laid he up in the same. And Joseph gathered corn as the sand of the

sea, very much, until he left off numbering; for it was without number.

The land of Egypt is six hundred miles long, and is bounded by two ranges of naked limestone hills which sometimes approach, and sometimes retire from each other, leaving between them an average breadth of seven miles. Northwards they part and finally disappear, giving place to a marshy meadow plain which extends to the Mediterranean coast. To the south they are no longer of limestone, but of granite; they narrow to a point; they close till they almost touch; and through the mountain gate thus formed the river Nile leaps with a roar into the valley, and runs due north towards the sea. This land and its neighbourhood was first inhabited by the descendants of Ham, the third son of Noah; Mizraim, the second son of Ham, occupied Egypt. The noble river Nile is recorded in the Scriptures as the second river which parted from the main stream which went out of Eden to water the garden where Adam and Eve were placed by their Creator.

In the winter and spring it rolls a languid stream through a dry and dusty plain; but in the summer an extraordinary thing happens. The river grows troubled and swift, it turns red and then green; it rises, it swells, till at length, overflowing its banks, it covers the adjoining lands to the base of the hills on either side. The whole valley becomes a lake, from which the villages rise like islands, for they are built on artificial mounds. The land of Egypt is by nature a rainless desert, which the Nile, the mysterious Nile only, converts into a fruitful garden every year.