110 PLIirr's NATUEAL HISTOET. [Book IL 



CHAP. 79 (77.) — OP THE MODE IN WHICH THE DAYS ARE 

 COMPUTED. 



The days have been computed by different people in dif- 

 ferent ways. The Babylonians reckoned from one sunrise 

 to the next ; the Athenians from one sunset to the next ; the 

 Umbrians from noon to noon ; the multitude, universally, 

 from light to darkness ; the Eoman priests and those who 

 presided over the civil day, also the Egyptians and Hippar- 

 chus, from midnight to midnight ^ It appears that the in- 

 terval from one sunrise to the next is less near the solstices 

 than near the equinoxes, because the position of the zodiac 

 is more oblique about its middle part, and more straight 

 near the solstice^. 



CHAP. 80. (78.) — OF THE DIFPEEENCE OF NATIONS AS DE- 

 PENDING ON THE NATUEE OF THE WOELD. 



To these circumstances we must add those that are con- 

 nected with certain celestial causes. There can be no doubt, 

 that the Ethiopians are scorched by their vicinity to the 

 sun's heat, and they are bom, like persons who have been 

 bumed, Tvith the beard and hair frizzled^; while, in the 

 opposite and frozen parts of the earth, there are nations with 

 white skins and long, light hair. The latter are savage 

 from the inclemency of the climate, while the former are 

 dull from its variableness^. We learn, from the form of the 



1 A. Gellius, iii. 3, informs us, that the question concerning the com- 

 mencement of the day was one of the topics discussed by Varro, in his 

 book " Rerum Humanarum : " this work is lost. We learn from tlie 

 notes of Hardouin, Lemaire, i. 399, that there are certain coimtries in 

 which all these various modes of computation are stUl practised ; the 

 last-mentione(i is the one commonly employed in Europe. 



2 It has been supposed, that in this passage the author intended to 

 say no more than that the nights are shorter at the summer solstice than 

 at the other parts of the year ; see Alexandre in Lemaire, i. 399, 400. 

 But to this, I conceive, it may be objected, that the words " inter ortus 

 solis " can scarcely apply to the period while the sun is below the horizon, 

 and that the solstices generally would seem to be opposed to the equinoxes 

 generally. Also the words "obhquior" and " rectior" would appear to 

 have some farther reference than merely to the length of time during 

 which the sun is above or below the horizon. 



8 " Vibrato ; " the same term is applied by TtuTius to the hair of ^neas ; 

 ^n. xii. 100. 



* " Mobilitate hebetes j " it is not easy to see the connexion between 

 these two circumstances. 



