Book 19
5
In that book it was written Frag. 214, Rose. that water from snow was very bad to drink, as was also that water which was more solidly and completely congealed, which the Greeks call kru/stallos, or clear ice; and the following reason was there given for this: That when water is hardened by the cold air and congeals, it necessarily follows that evaporation takes place and that a kind of very thin vapour, so to speak, is forced from it and comes out of it. But its lightest part, he said, is that which is evaporated; what remains is heavier and less clean and wholesome, and this part, beaten upon by the throbbing of the air, takes on the form and colour of white foam. But that some more wholesome part is forced out and evaporated from the snow is shown by the fact that it becomes less than it was before it congealed.
5
I have taken a few of Aristotle's own words from that book, and I quote them: Why is the water made from snow or ice unwholesome? Because from all water that is frozen the lightest and thinnest part evaporates. And the proof of this is that when it melts after being frozen, its volume is less than before. But since the most wholesome part is gone, it necessarily follows that what is left is less wholesome. After I read this, we decided to pay honour to the learned Aristotle. And so I for my part immediately declared war upon snow and swore hatred against it,1 while the others made truces with it on various terms.
