Egypt, and that he wrote of it as a familiar country. For example :

Joseph was bought as a slave.

Slaves are depicted on the oldest monuments.

Joseph was exalted to be steward.

The steward, with his books, is represented on the tombs, over every great household.

Joseph used a cup in divining.

Divining with a cup is pictured on the tombs.

Pharaoh dreamed of kine from the river.

The cow and the river are symbols of plenty.

Pharaoh gave Joseph a gold chain upon his neck.

This ornament is seen in the pictures of princes, and gold ornaments, of ancient Egyptian manufacture, are to be seen in the Louvre, and in the British Museum.

Joseph built storehouses for grain.

Pictures of granaries are found in coeval tombs.

Joseph's brethren sat at meat.

In the pictures of feasts, on the tombs, the guests are seen sitting, instead of reclining.

Jacob was embalmed, and was buried with great mourning. The Egyptians embalmed their dead, and long funeral processions are found upon the tombs.

The Israelites made bricks with straw.

Chopped straw is found in ancient bricks.

Moses was put in an ark of papyrus and bitumen.

These were in common use for mummy cases.

The daughter of Pharaoh came to bathe.

There is on a tomb a picture of a female bathing, attended by four maids. Such public exposure of women is not Oriental, but Egyptian.

The Israelites were pursued with chariots.

Every battle-scene abounds in chariots of war.

Mirian rejoiced with timbrels.

Timbrels and harps were Egyptian instruments of music.

CHAPTER IV.

IN THE WILDERNESS.—FROM B.C. 1491 TO B.C. 1451.

The Wilderness-Brief History of the Wanderings of the Israelites- Want of Water -The Sweetening of Bitter Waters-Elim-Manna-Quails-Djibbel Moussa— The Giving of the Law-Setting up of the Tabernacle, and Establishment of the Aaronic Priesthood-A Battle with the Canaanites-Conspiracy in the CampDestruction of the Conspirators- Death of Aaron-Moab-Balak and BalaamDescription of Palestine.

THE Israelites went forth from a land of plenty into a desert. The region on which they entered was truly a desert. In the midst of it, the impression given even now, is that of utter and savage dreariness. It appears wholly pathless. Except a few railway-stations, scarcely a house is to be seen, only once or twice in the course of twenty miles is there the sign of tree or shrub. A sprinkling of the tufts of a wiry grass, show a desperate struggle for life, in the midst of a deathly desolation.

It needed strong faith on the part of the Israelites, to venture into this desert land, a boundless, all-consuming waste. To many it would appear the climax of folly, the prelude to swift destruction. It needed a pillar of cloud and of fire to give confidence to the people. The host of Israel being so numerous, being attended by a mixed multitude, having with them their flocks and herds, and being, moreover, only to a small extent organized, it is difficult to see how they could possibly have been kept together, so as to march in any one direction, or to come anywhere into camp without some such provision. The cloudy pillar rising high over the desert afforded them the needed rallying point; without this it is most probable they would have become scattered from one another, confused, and lost.

The history of the wandering is briefly as follows: After crossing the Red Sea, the people journeyed leisurely to Sinai, about one hundred and fifty miles to the south-east, reaching that most secluded and sublime locality in the third month after the Exodus. Here they remained nearly a year, going thence northward, by a journey of eleven days, to the southern border

of Palestine. From here spies were sent through the land, who, on returning, gave such report of what they had seen, as discouraged the people, set them murmuring, and turned them back to weary wanderings in the wilderness for eight-and-thirty years. At the end of this time, they are found again in the same spot on the southern frontier, seeking to make their way through the south-east border of the country, so as to approach it on the east flank. After various circuitous and wearisome marches, relieved, however, by signal victories over their opponents, they attain their object, reaching the plains of Moab, the elevated region east of the Jordan, directly opposite the city of Jericho. Here, with the goal of their long and ardent pursuit in full view, Moses rehearses the history of the people and the Divine law on behalf of the new generation-for the carcasses of the old generation had fallen in the wilderness-resigns to Joshua the command of the people, sings his farewell song of thanksgiving, bestows his benediction on the tribes, and, by appointment of God, ascends a mountain summit, from which, before he dies, a view is granted him of the land covenanted to his ancestors, and destined for ages to be the home of their posterity.

But we must follow the course of the Israelites in more detail.

Their first great necessity was their want of water. The ground was parched up; there was no moisture, nothing to satisfy the people, much less their flocks and herds. What water they found was bitter, and not fit for drinking. They were much cast down, repenting already the step they had taken in leaving Egypt. The slavery to which they had been reduced had taken out of them all manly fortitude; and without attaining to the wisdom of the Egyptians, they had contracted most of their vile habits. Disappointed in not finding the desert a rich and goodly land; scoffing at the promises made to their fathers; tired, weary, and worn, they railed on their deliverer: while the women besought him, as though he were a God, to give them water. Josephus tells us that Moses betook himself to prayer, that He would change the water from its present badness, and make it fit for drinking. "And when God had