22. The animal makes his lair among dense beds of reeds of great height, and while keeping quiet watches vigilantly for every opportunity of sallying out to feed on the crops. And when he has gorged himself, and is ready to return, he walks backwards, and makes many tracks, to prevent any enemies from following the straight road and so finding and easily killing him.
23. Again, when he feels lazy from having his stomach swollen by excessive eating, it rolls its thighs and legs on freshly-cut reeds, in order that the blood which is discharged through the wounds thus made may relieve his fat. And then he smears his wounded flesh with clay till the wounds get scarred over.
24. This monster was very rare till it was first exhibited to the Roman people in the ædileship of Scaurus, the father of that Scaurus whom Cicero defended, when he charged the Sardinians to cherish the same opinion as the rest of the world of the authority of that noble family. Since that time, at different periods, many specimens have been brought to Rome, and now they are not to be found in Egypt, having been driven, according to the conjecture of the inhabitants, up to the Blemmyæ[135] by being incessantly pursued by the people.
25. Among the birds of Egypt, the variety of which is countless, is the ibis, a sacred and amiable bird, also valuable, because by heaping up the eggs of serpents in its nest for food it causes these fatal pests to diminish.
26. They also sometimes encounter flocks of winged snakes, which come laden with poison from the marshes of Arabia. These, before they can quit their own region, they overcome in the air, and then devour them. This bird, we are told, produces its young through its mouth.
27. Egypt also produces innumerable quantities of serpents, destructive beyond all other creatures. Basilisks, amphisbænas,[136] scytalæ, acontiæ, dipsades, vipers, and many others. The asp is the largest and most beautiful of all; but that never, of its own accord, quits the Nile.
28. There are also in this country many things exceedingly worthy of observation, of which it is a good time now to mention a few. Everywhere there are temples of great size. There are seven marvellous pyramids, the difficulty of building which, and the length of time consumed in the work, are recorded by Herodotus. They exceed in height anything ever constructed by human labour, being towers of vast width at the bottom and ending in sharp points.
29. And their shape received this name from the geometricians because they rise in a cone like fire (πῦρ). And huge as they are, as they taper off gradually, they throw no shadow, in accordance with a principle of mechanics.
30. There are also subterranean passages, and winding retreats, which, it is said, men skilful in the ancient mysteries, by means of which they divined the coming of a flood, constructed in different places lest the memory of all their sacred ceremonies should be lost. On the walls, as they cut them out, they have sculptured several kinds of birds and beasts, and countless other figures of animals, which they call hieroglyphics.
31. There is also Syene, where at the time of the summer solstice the rays surrounding upright objects do not allow the shadows to extend beyond the bodies. And if any one fixes a post upright in the ground, or sees a man or a tree standing erect, he will perceive that their shadow is consumed at the extremities of their outlines. This also happens at Meroe, which is the spot in Ethiopia nearest to the equinoctial circle, and where for ninety days the shadows fall in a way just opposite to ours, on account of which the natives of that district are called Antiscii.[137]