beside him and laid his hand in caress upon the wasted hand of his father. His eyes opened; he gazed into Joseph’s face and smiled, as if all his troubles were now ended.

‘Thou hast come,’ he said. ‘It is enough. There is little time left to me, my son, and I have one urgent thing to ask of thee. If peradventure I have found grace in thy sight, I entreat thee that in the last thou wilt deal kindly and truly with me, and bury me not in Egypt, where I am a stranger, but carry me again into Canaan, the land of my fathers. There and with them let me lie at rest in the burial place that is prepared for me.’

Joseph gazed into the wasted face. ‘In anything thou mayst ask of me, so in truth will I do.’

And Jacob said: ‘Nay, I entreat thee, let it be a vow between thee and me, my son, for it is a matter very near to my heart.’

Joseph sware unto him, and his father was greatly comforted. Strength returned into him. He raised himself in his bed and thanked God that he was now at peace.

Then Joseph brought his two sons into the presence of his father. They stood within the entry, tarrying until he should call them near.

But Jacob’s eyes were dim and he looked at them without recognition. ‘Who are these?’ he said.

‘These are my two sons,’ said Joseph, ‘whom thou knowest well. They were given me of God in Egypt, and are come to ask thy blessing.’

He led them by the hand and brought them to the bedside, and his father stretched out his hand and laid his right hand on Ephraim’s head and his left hand on Manasseh’s, and he did this wittingly though he knew that Manasseh was Joseph’s firstborn. For in the light of death he foresaw that in years to come the descendants of the younger would exceed those of the elder in greatness and numbers. And he blessed them and embraced them.

He reminded Joseph how the Lord God had appeared to him in a vision in the night when he lay sleeping in the wilds of Bethel, and how he had made known to him that those who came after him should inherit the land of Canaan for an everlasting inheritance.

‘Very dear was thy mother Rachel to me, my son, but when we were journeying from Bethel but a little distance from Ephrath near Bethlehem, she died at the wayside. I mourned and wept over her, and there I buried her. How then could I else than love thee very dearly also, thee and thy brother Benjamin? So, too, these thy sons, whom thou lovest, shall be remembered, and they shall partake of the glories of Israel when it has become a nation and is entered into the land that God hath promised. For many long and weary years I had not thought to see thy face again, and now behold God hath not only restored thee to me, but hath given me breath to bless thy two sons also.’

And Ephraim and Manasseh bowed themselves before the bed and withdrew. When Joseph was again alone with his father he watched beside him, and between his fitful slumbers they communed together.

‘Behold I die,’ said Jacob, ‘but God shall be with thee.’

And Joseph stooped himself, weeping, beside the bed, and kissed his father, and Jacob gave him his last blessing.

Then the rest of his sons came together into his presence and he blessed them one and all, predicting with his last words what the future would bring forth for all that came after them, their children’s children for unnumbered generations. For though the shadows of death were drawing over him, his mind was clear and his vision untroubled. With this he bade them a last farewell, and composed himself to die. He drew his feet up into the bed, yielded up his spirit to God who gave it, and was gathered to his people.