Budge_Ethiopic_Alexander

Job and
Pharaoh,
Solomon's
wisdom.
XXXVI INTRODUCTION.
with the Hebrew patriarchs, beginning with Adam
and ending with Solomon. In the case of Enoch
he describes how sinful men had become and with
what abominable practices they had corrupted
themselves, and a curious statement is made to
the effect that the children of Cain settled in the
land of Alexandria. Another curious legend, also,
is preserved in his account of Job, for this pa-
triarch is said to have been consulted by Pharaoh,
king of Egypt, about the slaughter of the children
of Israel, and all the evils which came upon him
are described as punishments laid upon him be-
cause he did not "wax furious" with Pharaoh at
the suggestion. To Solomon, the son of David,
miraculous powers are attributed, for he could
hear the worm crawling on the tiles of the floor,
and he could see in the air the bird which was
beyond the ken of ordinary mortals; for himself
he built a glass house which contained ten thousand
rooms! Further, the translator having represented
Alexander as leading the life of a Christian kino-
during his travels, very consistently makes him
bequeath ten thousand dinaiiir to the churches of
Egypt after his death (p. 345). We cannot here
Alexander coutiuue the Hst of the evidences of the hand of
Christian thc Christian translator, for they will be further
churches, j^gntloned In the account of the "Christian Romance"
(pp. 437—584); we may, therefore, pass on
to other peculiarities of the version.
In the Ethlopic version Alexander's famous steed
Bucephalus Is said to have been a mare (p. 19),
'