“He came here as a slave, and was certainly brought from the country whence our oppressors came. But they say that he was not of their race, but that his forefathers had come into the land from a country lying far to the east; but that I know not. Suffice it he gained the confidence of the king, became his minister, and ruled wisely as far as the king was concerned, though the people have little reason to bless his memory. In his days was a terrible famine, and they say he foretold its coming, and that his gods gave him warning of it. So vast granaries were constructed and filled to overflowing, and when the famine came and the people were starving the grain was served out, but in return the people had to give up their land. Thus the whole tenure of the land in the country was changed, and all became the property of the state, the people remaining as its tenants upon the land they formerly owned. Then it was that the state granted large tracts to the temples, and others to the military order, so that at present all tillers of land pay rent either to the king, the temples, or the military order. “Thus it is that the army can always be kept up in serviceable order, dwelling by its tens of thousands in the cities assigned to it. Thus it is that the royal treasury is always kept full, and the services of the temples maintained. The step has added to the power and dignity of the nation, and has benefited the cultivators themselves by enabling vast works of irrigation to be carried out--works that could never have been accomplished had the land been the property of innumerable small holders, each with his own petty interests.” “But you said, father, that it has not been for the good of the people.” “Nor has it in one respect, Chebron, for it has drawn a wide chasm between the aristocratic classes and the bulk of the people, who can never own land, and have no stimulus to exertion.” “But they are wholly ignorant, father. They are peasants, and nothing more.” “I think they might be something more, Chebron, under other circumstances. However, that is not the question we are discussing. This Joseph brought his family out of the land at the east of the Great Sea, and land was given to them in Goshen, and they settled there and throve and multiplied greatly. Partly because of the remembrance of the services Joseph had rendered to the state, partly because they were a kindred people, they were held in favor as long as the shepherd kings ruled over us. But when Egypt rose and shook off the yoke they had groaned under so long, and drove the shepherds and their followers out of the land, this people--for they had now so grown in numbers as to be in verity a people--remained behind, and they have been naturally viewed with suspicion by us. They are akin to our late oppressors, and lying as their land does to the east, they could open the door to any fresh army of invasion.