equipped an army of four thousand six hundred men, providing
all the soldiers with shields and spears and bucklers
and helmets and slings. With this army, and aided by the
servants and officers of the king, and by the people of Egypt,
he carried on a war with Tarshish in the first year after his
appointment as viceroy. The people of Tarshish had invaded
the territory of the Ishmaelites, and the latter, few
in number at that time, were sore pressed, and applied to
the king of Egypt for help against their enemies. At the
head of his host of heroes, Joseph marched to the land of
Havilah, where he was joined by the Ishmaelites, and with
united forces they fought against the people of Tarshish,
routed them utterly, settled their land with the Ishmaelites,
while the defeated men took refuge with their brethren in
Javan. Joseph and his army returned to Egypt, and not a
man had they lost.

In a little while Joseph's prophecy was confirmed: that
year and the six following years were years of plenty, as
he had foretold.[191] The harvest was so ample that a single
ear produced two heaps of grain,[192] and Joseph made circumspect
arrangements to provide abundantly for the years of
famine. He gathered up all the grain, and in the city situated
in the middle of each district he laid up the produce
from round about, and had ashes and earth strewn on the
garnered food from the very soil on which it had been
grown;[193] also he preserved the grain in the ear; all these
being precautions taken to guard against rot and mildew.
The inhabitants of Egypt also tried, on their own account,
to put aside a portion of the superabundant harvest of the