However, the famine happened, as Joseph had foretold; and Joseph, to merit the good graces of his king, forced all the people to sell their land to Pharaoh, and all the nation became slaves to procure corn. This is apparently the origin of despotic power. It must be confessed, that never king made a better bargain; but the people also should no less bless the prime minister. Finally, the father and brothers of Joseph had also need of corn, for "the famine was sore in all lands." It is scarcely necessary to relate here how Joseph received his brethren; how he pardoned and enriched them. In this history is found all that constitutes an interesting epic poem--exposition, plot, recognition, adventures, and the marvellous; nothing is more strongly marked with the stamp of Oriental genius. What the good man Jacob, the father of Joseph, answered to Pharaoh, ought to strike all those who know how to read. "How old art thou?" said the king to him. "The days of the years of my pilgrimage," said the old man, "are an hundred and thirty years; few and evil have the days of the years of my life been." JUDÆA. I never was in Judæa, thank God! and I never will go there. I have met with men of all nations who have returned from it, and they have all of them told me that the situation of Jerusalem is horrible; that all the land round it is stony; that the mountains are bare; that the famous river Jordan is not more than forty feet wide; that the only good spot in the country is Jericho; in short, they all spoke of it as St. Jerome did, who resided a long time in Bethlehem, and describes the country as the refuse and rubbish of nature. He says that in summer the inhabitants cannot get even water to drink. This country, however, must have appeared to the Jews luxuriant and delightful, in comparison with the deserts in which they originated. Were the wretched inhabitants of the Landes to quit them for some of the mountains of Lampourdan, how would they exult and delight in the change; and how would they hope eventually to penetrate into the fine and fruitful districts of Languedoc, which would be to them the land of promise! Such is precisely the history of the Jews. Jericho and Jerusalem are Toulouse and Montpellier, and the desert of Sinai is the country between Bordeaux and Bayonne. But if the God who conducted the Israelites wished to bestow upon them a pleasant and fruitful land; if these wretched people had in fact dwelt in Egypt, why did he not permit them to remain in Egypt? To this we are answered only in the usual language of theology. Judæa, it is said, was the promised land. God said to Abraham: "I will give thee all the country between the river of Egypt and the Euphrates."