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No. III.

JACOB'S RETURN TO CANAAN.

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ACOB and Esau were the two sons of Isaac and Rebekah. When they were grown up, Esau became a cunning hunter, and led a restless unsettled life; but Jacob became a shepherd, and lived a quiet life in his father's tent. Isaac loved Esau best, because he was fond of the venison which he brought him home; but Rebekah loved Jacob, and when Isaac had become old and so blind that he could not see which was Esau and which was Jacob, he gave to Jacob the blessing which he had intended for Esau. Esau was very angry at this, and at last he hated his brother so much, that he said, “The days of mourning for my father are at hand: (meaning that his father would soon die,) then will I slay my brother Jacob."

When Rebekah was told what Esau had said, she

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sent for her favourite son Jacob, and bade him fly to her brother Laban, who lived at a place called Haran, and to stay there until his brother's anger had passed away. His father Isaac gave him his blessing before he went away, and desired him to take one of Laban's daughters for a wife: then he prayed and said, "God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be a multitude of people.

"And give thee the blessing of Abraham, to thee, and to thy seed with thee; that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger, which God gave unto Abraham."

Jacob obeyed his father and mother, and went to Laban, his mother's brother, at Haran: he told him that he was the son of his sister Rebekah, and agreed to serve him and take care of his flocks for seven years, if, at the end of that time, he would give him his daughter Rachael, to be his wife. Laban promised; but when the seven years were at an end, he only gave him his eldest daughter Leah, and said that he must serve him yet another seven years for Rachel.

Jacob served him faithfully these seven years also, and then Laban gave him Rachel.

Jacob continued some years longer with Laban, until he had many children :-until Leah had six sons and a daughter, and Rachel one son, whom she called Joseph.

After Joseph was born, Jacob thought he should like to go back to his own country, and see his father and his friends once more. He, therefore, said to Laban, "Give me my wives and my children, for whom I have served thee, and let me go for thou knowest my service which I have done thee." But Laban would not let him go, "for" said he, "I have learned by experience, that the Lord hath blessed me for thy sake." He promised that if Jacob would serve him yet again, he should have all the speckled cattle for his own. But Jacob's flocks increased so much more quickly than Laban's, that Laban's sons were angry, and said that Jacob was taking away all their father's cattle.

Jacob heard what they said, and saw that Laban no longer looked kindly upon him. "And the Lord said unto Jacob, Return unto the land of thy fathers, and to thy kindred, and I will be with thee." Then Jacob collected his flocks together, and called his wives to him, telling them that God had commanded

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