375 
when referred to, is often characterized as “His Majesty.” To 
swear by the life of Pharaoh might be pardonable, or even 
customary, in a courtier, but was a punishable offence in a 
person of low degree. 
His high counsellors enjoyed a title which is rendered, in our 
version, “ lather to Pharaoh nb lePharcio, in Hebrew; but 
tms seems to have been common as a designation of the officers 
ot highest rank at court.* 
Lower down in the scale were superintendents of the vocal 
music of the wardrobe, of the baths— and others who attended 
as hairdressers, and in various particulars served “His 
Majesty : even the care of his nails gave occcasion to the 
services of a special officer, and we may be sure the duties of 
chief butler atid baker were not forgotten. 
+n ^ir- L ^ ai - aCter ^ oses > t-he chosen leader of the Israelites, 
the King m Jeshurun— is thus given in Numbers xiii. 3: 
iNow this man Moses was very meek, above all the men which 
were upon the face of the earth ” — a remarkable contrast to the 
divinely worshipped Pharaohs. 
The Present of Egypt. 
The present state of Egypt is one of great interest, as it is 
evidently coming forward to take some leading share in the 
great events which are coming upon us in these latter days. 
The formation of the Suez Canal is, in itself, a sure indication 
of this; for every country through which the great traffic 
between the Last and West — between Asia and Europe — has 
flowed from the earliest ages, has been enriched and invigorated 
thereby. But, quite apart from this, Egypt has made great 
advances towards some renewal of her former prosperity. 
The deadly incubus of Mahommedan fanaticism has, to 
a certain extent, given way before the light of European 
civilization, and the rulers have done something for the im- 
provement of the country. The present Khedive has brought 
350,000 acres of desert into cultivation, and, by improved irri- 
gation, ^has greatly increased the general productiveness of the 
soil. There^are now, in working order, 113 navigable canals, 
which feed 750 smaller canals, which, again, are subdivided 
into innumerable little channels, by which fertility is spread 
over the land. 
Egypt has now, as we are told, 5,250,000 inhabitants. It 
scarcely could have contained more at the time of the Pharaohs. 
# Brngsch, VExode, p. 17. 
