PRELUDE. 33 



does what he commonly does in summer; he draws 



the water to him (e\/cet evr' ewi/rov TO vSwp), and 



having thus drawn it, he pushes it to the upper 

 regions (of the air probably,) and then the winds 

 take it and disperse it till they dissolve in moisture. 

 And thus the winds which blow from those coun- 

 tries, Libs and Notus, are the most moist of all 

 winds. Now when the winter relaxes and the sun 

 returns to the north, he still draws water from all 

 the rivers, but they are increased by showers and 

 rain-torrents, so that they are in flood till the 

 summer comes ; and then, the rain failing and the 

 sun still drawing them, they become small. But 

 the Nile, not being fed by rains, yet being drawn 

 by the sun, is, alone of all rivers, much more scanty 

 in the winter than in the summer. For in summer 

 it is drawn like all other rivers, but in winter it 

 alone has its supplies shut up. And in this way, I 

 have been led to think the sun is the cause of the 

 occurrence in question." We may remark that the 

 historian here appears to ascribe the inequality of 

 the Nile at different seasons to the influence of the 

 sun upon its springs alone, the other cause of change, 

 the rains, being here excluded: and that, on this 

 supposition, the same relative effects would be pro- 

 duced whether the sun increase the sources in winter 

 by melting the snows, or diminish them in summer 

 by what he calls drawing them upwards. 



This specimen of the early efforts of the Greeks 

 in physical speculations, appears to me to speak 

 VOL. i. D 



