110 
PLIIiTT'S IS^ATURAL HISTOET. 
[Book IL 
CHAP. 79 (77.) — or the mode in which the days aee 
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 Boman 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.) — CP THE DIEEEBE^fCE OF KATTOISTS AS DE- 
PEI^DIJ^G OK THE I^ATUEE OE 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 born, like persons who have been 
burned, with 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 
^ A. Grellius, iii. 3, informs us, that the question concerning the com- 
mencement of the day was one of the topics discussed by Yarro, in his 
hook " Rerum Humanarum : " this work is lost. We learn from the 
notes of Hardouin, Lemaire, i. 399, that there are certain countries in 
which all these various modes of computation are still practised ; the 
last-mentioned 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 siunmer 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 
soHs " 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 dm-ing 
which the sun is above or below the horizon. 
3 " Vibrato ; " the same term is appUed by Turnus to the hair of JEneas ; 
^n. xii. 100. 
* *' Mobihtate hebetes ; " it is not easy to see the connexion between 
these two circumstances. 
