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Ioseph.

CHAP. XLII.

ND Iacob hearing, that victuals were sold in Ægypt, he said to his sonnes: Why neglect ye? I haue heard that wheat is sold in Ægypt: Goe ye downe, and buy vs necessaries, that we may liue and not be consumed with lacke. Therfore the ten brethren of Ioseph going downe to buy corne in Ægypt, Beniamin being kept at home by Iacob, who said to his brethren: Lest perhaps he take any harme in the iourney: entred into the land of Ægypt with others that went to buy. For the famine was in the land of Chanaan. And Ioseph was prince in the land of Ægypt, and at his pleasure corne was sold to the people. And when his brethren had adored him, and he knew them, he spake as it were to strangers ″ somewhat roughly, asking them: From whence came you? Who answered: From the Land of Chanaan, that we may buy necessaries to liue. And yet himselfe knowing his brethren, was not knowen of them. And remembring the dreames, which sometimes he had seen, he said to them: ″ You are spies: to view the weaker parts of the land you are come. Who said: It is not so, my lord, but thy seruantes are come to buy victuals. We are al the sonnes of one man: we are come as men of peace, neither do thy seruantes goe about anie euil. To whom he answered: It is otherwise: you came to consider the vndefensed parts of this land. But they: We thy seruantes, say they, are twelue brethren, the sonnes of one man in the Land of Chanaan: the yongest is with our father, the other is not liuing. This is it, quoth he, that I said: You are spies. Now presently I wil take a trial of you: ″ by the health of Pharao you shal not depart hence, vntil your yongest brother do come. Send you one of you to bring him: and you shal be in prison, til the things be proued which you haue said, whether they be true or false: otherwise by the health of Pharao you are spies. Therfore he put them in prison three dayes. And the third day bringing them out of prison, he said: Doe as I haue said, and you shal liue: for I feare God. If you be men of peace, let one of your brethren be bound in prison: and goe ye your wayes, and carie the corne that you haue bought vnto your houses, and bring your yongest brother to me, that I may Rh