231For this reason the golden Sun rules the world, measured out in fixed parts, through the twelve constellations of the heavens. 233Five zones hold the sky; 233of which one is always red with the flashing sun and always scorched by fire; 235around it the outermost ones stretch, to right and left, dark blue, frozen with ice and black rains; 237between these and the middle one, two have been granted to feeble mortals by the gift of the gods, and a path is cut through both, where the slanting order of the signs might turn. 240The world, as it rises steep towards Scythia and the Rhipaean heights, slopes down and sinks towards the south winds of Libya.
242This pole is always high above us; 242but that one black Styx and the deep shades below see beneath their feet. 244Here the huge Serpent glides out in winding coils around and between the two Bears like a river, the Bears that fear to be dipped in the surface of Ocean. 247There, as they say, either the dead of night is silent and the darkness is ever thickened under its mantle of night, or Dawn returns from us and brings back the day; 250and when the rising Sun first breathes on us with panting horses, there glowing Vesper kindles his late lights. 252From this we can foretell the weather when the sky is doubtful, from this the day of harvest and the time of sowing, and when it is fitting to strike the treacherous marble of the sea with oars, when to launch armed fleets, or to fell the pine in the woods in its due season.