Kitap 10
' Opposing: while the sun divides the year,
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' And day from night, and by his potent rays
' Forbids the stars to pass their stated course.
' The moon by her alternate phases sets
' The varying limits of the sea and shore.
' Neath Saturn's sway the zone of ice and snow
' Has passed; while Mars in lightning's fitful flames
' And winds abounds: beneath high Jupiter
' Unvexed by storms abides a temperate air;
' And fruitful Venus' star contains the seeds
' Of all things. Ruler of the boundless deep
' The god Mercury. (See Book IX., 778.) Cyllenian : whene'er he holds
' That part of heaven where the Lion dwells
' With neighbouring Cancer joined, and Sirius star
' Flames in its fury; where the circular path
' (Which marks the changes of the varying year)
' Gives to hot Cancer and to Capricorn
' Their several stations, under which doth lie
' The fount of Nile, he, master of the waves,
' Strikes with his beam the waters. Forth the stream
' Brims from his fount, as Ocean when the moon
' Commands an increase; nor shall curb his flow
' Till night wins back her losses from the sun.That is, at the autumnal equinox. The priest states that the planet Mercury causes the rise of the Nile. The passage is difficult to follow; but the idea would seem to be that this god, who controlled the rise and fall of the waves of the sea, also when he was placed directly over the Nile caused the rise of that river.
' Vain is the ancient faith that Ethiop snows So also Herodotus, Book II., 22. Yet modern discoveries have proved the snows.
' Send Nile abundant forth upon the lands.
' Those mountains know nor northern wind nor star.
' Of this are proof the breezes of the South,
' Fraught with warm vapours, and the people's hue
' Burned dark by suns: and 'tis in time of spring,
' When first are thawed the snows, that ice-fed streams
' In swollen torrents tumble; but the Nile
' Nor lifts his wave before the Dog star burns;
' Nor seeks again his banks, until the sun
' In equal balance measures night and day.
' Nor are the laws that govern other streams
' Obeyed by Nile. For in the wintry year
'Were he in flood, when distant far the sun,
' His waters lacked their office; but he leaves
' His channel when the summer is at height,
' Tempering the torrid heat of Egypt's clime.
