and fourth scenes were in the scheme of the Cincinnati Music
Festival, Theodore Thomas, conductor, on May 25,1894.

Each of the eight scenes into which the work is divided deals with
an episode in the life of Israel's lawgiver. In the first scene we
have the incident of the finding of the child in the bulrushes; in
the second occurs the oppression of the Israelites by the Egyptian
taskmasters, the slaying of one of the overseers by Moses, who,
till then regarded as the king's son, now proclaims himself one of
the oppressed race. The third scene discloses Moses protecting
Zipporah, daughter of Jethro, a Midianitish priest, from a band of
marauding Edomites, his acceptance of Jethro's hospitality and the
scene of the burning bush and the proclamation of his mission.
Scene IV deals with the plagues, those of blood, hail, locusts,
frogs, and vermin being delineated in the instrumental introduction
to the part, the action beginning while the land is shrouded in the
"thick darkness that might be felt." The Egyptians call upon Osiris
to dispel the darkness, but are forced at last to appeal to Moses.
He demands the liberation of his people as the price to be paid for
the removal of the plague; receiving a promise from Pharaoh, he
utters a prayer ending with "Let there be light." The result is
celebrated in a brilliant choral acclamation of the returning sun.
The scene has a parallel in Rossini's opera. Pharaoh now
equivocates; he will free the sons of Jacob, but not the women,
children, or chattels. Moses threatens punishment in the death of
all of Egypt's first-born, and immediately solo and chorus voices
bewail the new affliction. When the king hears that his son is dead
he gives his consent, and the Israelites depart with an ejaculation
of thanks to Jehovah. The passage of the Red Sea, Miriam's
celebration of that miracle, the backsliding of the Israelites and