16 BOYS OF THE BIBLE.

a most delicious meal. There was red pottage, steaming
hot—and if there was one thing more than another that
Esau loved it was red pottage. Then there was bread and
wine, and everything that Jacob could think of to tempt the
appetite of the huntsman. The savory odor of that meal
reached Esau as he drew near the tent, and gave a keener
edgé to his hunger. Jacob had got everything in order, and
he was quite ready for the trying moment. He knew Esau
would be half famished; he knew how he loved pottage and
lentiles, and he stood by the tent door and waited. ;

“And Esau said to Jacob, Feed me, I pray thee, with
that same red pottage; for I am faint: therefore was his
name called Edom. And Jacob said, Sell me this day thy
birthright. And Esau said, Behold, I am at the point to
die: and what profit shall this birthright do to me? And
Jacob said, Swear to me this day; and he sware unto him:
and he sold his birthright unto Jacob. Then Jacob gave
Esau bread and pottage of lentils; and he did eat and
drink, and rose up, and went his way: and Esau despised
his birthright.”

We can only understand this story, as we remember
that, of all thing counted sacred in these old days, the
birthright was most sacred. If Jacob was mean in bargain-
ing for this priceless inheritance after this unbrotherly
fashion, Esau was foolish—nay, as we shall see shortly—he
was “profane” in the real deep meaning of that word, for

so easily parting with his treasure. A young man who
could buy his brother’s birthright in such a manner was
mean, to the very uttermost verge of meanness. But it is

also true, that a young man who would sell such a treasure
for a meal, no matter how hungry he was, had a very poor
estimate of his birthright.