-he was welcomed by the kindred of the
mother.

The brother of Rebekah had two daughters. Leah, the elder, was
tender-eyed, but Rachel was beautiful; and both sisters loved their
cousin, while the heart of Jacob clung to the younger, the fair damsel
who first welcomed him; so that he overlooked the claims of the
elder,--the plain, if not disfigured, Leah. He brought no offerings with
him to conciliate the favour of the father, and, according to the custom
of the East, to facilitate his marriage. But he offered his personal
service as an equivalent. And the son of Isaac served seven years for
the daughter of Laban. But this long period was passed; and dwelling, as
Jacob did, in the presence of Rachel, a member of the household of her
father, they seemed but as a few days, for the love he bore her.

But the time had now arrived when the marriage should be celebrated, and
Jacob claimed his bride. But he who had wronged his brother, who had by
disguise deceived his father, was now imposed upon by guile and
treachery; and all the hopes and expectations of these long years were
defeated. The customs of Eastern marriages favoured the deceit, and
Jacob found that he was wedded to Leah, and not to the object of his
affection. The deceit was most unjustifiable. The disappointment and the
resentment must have been proportionally great; and miserable was the
excuse of Laban, and wretched the device which was offered as an
atonement. Yet Jacob must have bowed before the retributions of an
avenging God, and the remembrance of his own treachery may have stayed
his anger.

Thus commenced the family of Jacob, with all the elements of dissension,
strife and bitterness incorporated into its very earliest existence. The
daughters of Laban both became the wives of Jacob, and they were rivals
as women, as sisters, as wives and as mothers--forced to dwell
together, yet ever in sullen hatred or bitter strife. When the ties of
natural affection are severed, the heart never ceases to bleed; and
there is no hatred so deep, so implacable as that which springs up where
hearts once knit are thus alienated and forced asunder: and the sorrows
and evils which sprang up in the family of Jacob may have led to that
command so explicitly given by Moses--"Neither shalt thou take a wife to
her sister to vex her, in her lifetime."

The heart of Jacob never departed from Rachel. She was the chosen bride.
He loved her with a deep and true affection, while t