Page:The Natural History of Pliny.djvu/144

 110 plikt's natural history. [Book IL CHAP. 79 (77.) — OP THE MODE 1^ WHICH THE DATS 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 TJmbrians 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- ter^^al 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.) — OP THE DIPPEREIS'CE OP NATIONS AS DE- PENDING ON THE NATURE OP THE WORLD. 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 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, La his book "Rerum Humanarum : " this work is lost. We learn from the notes of Hardouin, Lemaire, i. 399, that there are certain counti'ies in which aU 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 summer solstice than at the other parts of the year ; see Alexandre in Lemau-e, i. 399, 400. But to this, I conceive, it may be objected, that the words " inter ortus Bolis " 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. 3 " Vibrato ; " the same term is appUed by Tumus to the hair of ^neas ; ^n. xii. 100. these two cu'cumstances.
 * " MobHitate hebetes ; " it is not easy to see the connexion between