| [p. 109]
Courage, endurance, industry and high spirit could
not arise in such conditions either among the
natives or among immigrants, | The writer is thinking of Asiatic
natives and the Greek
colonists on the coast of Asia Minor. |
but pleasure must
be supreme . . .| There is a gap in the text here dealing with the
Egyptians
and Libyans. |
wherefore in the beasts they are
of many shapes.
PART 13
XIII. Such in my opinion is the condition of the
Egyptians and Libyans. As to the dwellers on the
right of the summer risings of the sun up to Lake
Maeotis, which is the boundary between Europe
and Asia, their condition is as follows. These
nations are less homogeneous than those I have
described, because of the changes of the seasons
and the character of the region. The land is
affected by them exactly as human beings in
general are affected. For where the seasons experience
the most violent and the most frequent
changes, | Or, more idiomatically, "the variations of climate are
most violent and most frequent." The four changes at the
end of the four seasons were only the most important of
many μεταβολαι. See Chapter XI, and pp. 68, 69. |
the land too is
very wild and very uneven ;
you will find there many wooded mountains, plains
and meadows. But where the seasons do not alter
much, the land is very even. So it is too with the
inhabitants, if you will examine the matter. Some
physiques resemble wooded, well-watered mountains,
others light, dry land, others marshy meadows,
others a plain of bare, parched earth. For the
seasons which modify a physical frame differ ; if the
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