But the eagerness of the princess was so great, that she could not wait till the damsel brought her the basket, and she stretched forth her arm towards it, and her arm was lengthened sixty ells, so that she was able to take hold of the ark and draw it to land, and lift the child out of the water.
No sooner had she touched the babe, than she was healed of the boils which afflicted her, and the splendour of the face of the child was like that of the sun.[[469]] She looked at it with wonder, and admired its beauty. But her father’s stern law made her fear, and she thought to return the child to the water, when he began to cry, for the angel Gabriel had boxed his ears to make him weep, and thus excite the compassion of the princess. Then Miriam, hid away among the rushes, and little Aaron, aged three, hearing him cry, wept also.
The heart of the princess was stirred; and compassion, like that of a mother for her babe, filled her heart. She felt for the infant yearning love as though it were her own. “Truly,” said Bithia, “the Hebrews are to be pitied, for it is no easy matter to part with a child, and to deliver it over to death.”
Then, fearing that there would be no safety for the babe, if it were brought into the palace, she called to an Egyptian woman who was walking by the water, and bade her suckle the child. But the infant would not take the breast from this woman, nor from any other Egyptian woman that she summoned; and this the Almighty wrought that the child might be restored to its own mother again.
Then Miriam, the sister, mingled with those who came up, and said to Bithia, with sobs, “Noble lady! vain are all thine attempts to give the child the breast from one of a different race. If thou wouldst have a Hebrew woman, then let me fetch one, and the child will suck at once.”[[470]]
This advice pleased Bithia, and she bade Miriam seek her out a Hebrew mother.
With winged steps Miriam hastened home, and brought her mother, Jochebed, to the princess. Then the babe readily took nourishment from her, and ceased crying.
Astonished at this wonder, the king’s daughter said, but unawares, the truth, for she spake to Jochebed, “Here is thy child; take and nurse the child for me, and the wage shall be two pieces of silver a day.”
Jochebed did what she was bidden, but better reward than all the silver in Pharaoh’s house was the joy of having her son restored to his mother’s breast.
The self-same day the soothsayers and star-gazers said to Pharaoh, “The child of whom we spake to thee, that he should free Israel, hath met his fate in the water.”