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linen clothes, and generally put into a coffin of strong wood or stone, finely ornamented. Some had grand apartments prepared for them, where they were kept for many generations. Some of these bodies, called mummies, have been taken out of ancient tombs in Egypt, where they have been buried almost from the time of Joseph, and now, after more than three thousand years, are yet perfect, and to be seen in the British Museum in London. The whole time usually taken for embalming the body, was seventy days; and while those days lasted, the Egyptians, out of respect to Joseph as well as Jacob's family, mourned for his loss, as when in this country a king dies, everybody, out of respect, goes for a time into deep mourning.

When the seventy days were over, Joseph asked Pharaoh's leave to go into Canaan and bury his father, which Pharaoh readily granted. "And Joseph went to bury his father; and with him went up all the servants of Pharaoh, the elders," or most honourable men of his house, " and all the elders of the land of Egypt; and all the house of Joseph, and his brethren, and his father's house: only their little ones, and their flocks, and their herds, they left in the land of Goshen. And there went up with him both chariots and horsemen and it was a very great company." After the funeral, Joseph returned into Egypt. His brethren still feared his anger, knowing they deserved it, and supposed that he only withheld it till the death of his father, that he might not hurt the good old man's feelings. They therefore again implored Joseph's forgiveness, and pleaded that his father wished them so to do; and this might be true, for he perhaps thought they could not too much humble themselves for the wicked act of selling their own brother. Joseph then repeated his pardon, and said to them, "Fear not, for am I in the place of God? Ask pardon of God for your sin, but I will not take vengeance: besides, he overruled your cruelty for good. As for you, ye thought evil against me; but God meant it unto good, to bring to pass, as it is this day, to save much people alive. Now, therefore, fear ye not: I will nourish you and your little ones." And he comforted them, and spake kindly unto them.

Joseph was a chief man in Egypt for eighty years; for he was thirty years old when he was raised to his honours, and he died at an hundred and ten years old,—being the shortest lived of all the Patriarchs. Perhaps this was partly owing to his living the life of a courtier, which was less hardy, and therefore not so healthy as that of a shepherd. However, when he died, he had great great grandchildren to remember his name with respect; and, what was better than all, he died in faith, believing in a joyful resurrection and a promised Messiah.

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BECAUSE THIS BOOK GIVES AN ACCOUNT OF THE CHILDREN OF ISRAEL, THAT IS, OF JACOB, GOING OUT OF EGYPT.

The Children of Israel in Bondage.

EXODUS I.

FTER the death of Joseph, and of all his brethren, and of all the people that lived in the time of his greatness, another king reigned, called also Pharaoh, that being a general name for a king. "And the children of Israel were fruitful, and increased abundantly, and multiplied, and waxed exceeding mighty; and the land was filled with them."

Pharaoh was jealous on this account, and he burdened the Israelites with heavy taxes, and made them work for him at brick-making, and build his cities; and it is supposed by some that he made them build the famous pyramids, or huge monuments, which remain to this day in Egypt among the greatest wonders of the world; and he set over them task-masters, or men to overlook them and see that they kept hard at work. By so doing he kept them very poor, for they had not time to labour for themselves, and he tried to wear them out with slavery, that he might lessen their numbers; "But the more they afflicted them, the more they multiplied and grew."

So the king thought upon another plan to destroy them, and ordered all the little boys of the Hebrews to be drowned in the river Nile, as soon as they were born: but the Hebrew women, to whom he gave the orders, feared to commit murder, and God blessed them for it, and protected them, so that Pharaoh did them no harm for not obeying him.

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The Birth and wonderful Preservation of Moses.

EXODUS II.

About this time God gave a son to a man of the house of Levi, that is, ne descended from Levi, one of Joseph's brethren; probably a son of Levi's, for it was only about thirty years after Joseph's death.

Besides the love his mother had for him, as her son, she was struck with his great beauty, and she hid him for three months that she might save him from being drowned.

At last it is thought that Pharaoh sent spies to search out for all the little Hebrew babes that were boys; and Moses's mother, when she could no longer hide him, took for him an ark of bulrushes, and daubed it with slime and with pitch, and put the child therein, and she laid it in the flags by the river's brink. The ark means a boat, and the bulrushes were a sort of strong tall reed which grows on the banks of the Nile, the wood of which was tied together in little bundles; and these little bundles were again tied together, till enough were so tied as to make a boat of nearly the same shape as we could make it of wood. The slime and the pitch were to keep the water from getting into it, that it might not sink. The Egyptians made all their boats this way, till they found out a better method. Moses's mother perhaps knew the spot which Pharaoh's daughter used to visit, and might have hoped to move her to pity by his helplessness, and innocency, and beauty; and, being directed by Divine Providence, the poor little babe was put there, "and his sister, Miriam, stood afar off, to wit," or observe, "what would be done to him."

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“And the daughter of Pharaoh came down to wash herself," or, as some suppose, to wash her clothes," at the river," which was then no disgrace even to a king's daughter; "and her maidens" that attended upon her walked along by the river's side; and when she saw the ark," or little reed boat, "among the flags, she sent her maid to fetch it. And when she had opened it, she saw the child: and, behold, the babe wept. And she had compassion on him, and said, This is one of the Hebrews' children."

His sister drawing near, as if to see what was found, but not daring to tell whose child it was, said "to Pharaoh's daughter, Shall I go and call to thee a nurse of the Hebrew women, that she may nurse the child for thee? And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, Go. And the maid went and called the child's mother. And Pharaoh's daughter said unto her, Take this child away, and nurse it for me, and I will give thee thy wages. And the woman

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