688 TRAVELS/TO! DISCOVER T fk - 
that Herodotus fixes upon, as being fufficient to oblige the 
payment in his days; and the other is 16, or a cubit more; fo 
that if the Nilometer proves any thing at all, it is this, that 
prefumptively the Nile has never increafed from Meris to 
Petronius’s, or in 1400 years, and certainly that, if it has not 
diminifhed, it has not increafed for 700 years from Herodos 
tus to the emperor Julian. 
Procoprus, in his firft book, I think, fays, that 18 peeks’ 
was too full a Nile, and occafioned dearth by its quzntity. 
But, in the middle of the 6th century, he tells* us it ieqs1- 
red 18 cubits fora minimum, by which Egypt was to pay 
the meery; fothat in 100 years from Julian to Juftinian, the 
minimum had increafed three cubits, which was 4+ feet; 
not one foot in 100 years as the propofition bears; and 
this would prove too much, if it was. ee but it is srnlelatiae 
ble. - ‘ 
-Tuus far, then, we are at liberty to fay, that, as long as 
Egypt was a Greek kingdom, no vifible alteration or in- 
_creafe of the foil can be fairly eftablifhed from hiftory or 
infpection. 
* Procop. lib. iii. de Reb. Goth. 
CHAP. 
