Neither the cause nor yet the season of its overflow is the same as that of other rivers. Its waters rise neither because of melted snows nor by reason of rains flooding its rocky marge; for when dull winter giveth increase to other rivers Nile keeps within his banks; when other rivers flow with diminished stream, Nile, under other laws, rises. For of a truth whatever toll summer has exacted from all rivers Nature repays to the Nile, and waters gathered together from the whole world meet thus
quoque die Titana canis flagrantior armat
et rapit umores madidos venasque calore
compescit radiisque potentibus aestuat axis, 35
Nilo bruma venit, contraria tempora mundo:
defectis solitum referens cultoribus aequor
effluit Aegaeo stagnantior, acrior alto
Ionio seseque patentibus explicat arvis:
fluctuat omnis ager; remis sonuere novales; 40