At length there came on a fearful famine. The rain was withholden, and the dew shed its benediction no more upon the earth. He was compelled to seek bread at the court of Pharaoh, or perish. Knowing the power of female beauty, and the want of principle among the Egyptian princes, he was afraid of assassination and the captivity of Sarai which would follow. Haunted with this fear, he told her to say that she was his sister--which was not a direct falsehood, but only so by implication. According to the Jewish mode of reckoning relationship, she might be called a sister; and Abram stooped to this prevarication under that terrible dread which, in the case of Peter, drove a true disciple of Christ to the brink of apostacy and despair. [Illustration: Results of Prevarication. Peter denying his Master.] But his deception involved him in the very difficulty he designed to escape. The king's courtiers saw the handsome Hebrew, and extolled her beauty before him. He summoned her to the apartments of the palace, and captivated by her loveliness, determined to make her his bride. During the agonizing suspense of Abram, and the concealed anguish of Sarai in her conscious degradation, the hours wore heavily away, until the judgment of God upon the royal household brought deliverance. Pharaoh, though an idolater, knew by this supernatural infliction, that there was guilt in the transaction, and called Abram to an account. He had nothing to say in self-acquittal, and with a strange magnanimity, was sent away quietly, with his wife and property, followed only by the reproaches of Pharaoh, and his own wakeful conscience. Abram returned to Palestine, became a victor in fierce battles with a vastly outnumbering foe, and was in possession of a splendid fortune. Whether in Egypt, or in his tent on the plains of Palestine, Abram, with all the patriarchs, was a true gentleman. We may doubt whether any modern school of refinement in manners could furnish any nobler examples of dignity and civility in personal learning and manners, than were the rich dwellers in ancient Palestine. Subjects fell prostrate before sovereigns; equals, when they met, inclined the head toward the breast, and placed the right hand on the left breast. Of the Great King it is written, "Come, let us bow down; let us worship before the Lord our Maker."