They avoid using Grecian customs; and, in a word, the customs of all other people whatsoever.
The Egyptians who dwell in the morasses, have the same customs as the rest of the Egyptians, and each man has but one wife, like the Greeks. But to obtain food more easily, they have the following inventions: when the river is full, and has made the plains like a sea, great numbers of lilies, which the Egyptians call lotus, spring up in the water: these they gather and dry in the sun; then having pounded the middle of the lotus, which resembles a poppy, they make bread of it and bake it. The root also of this lotus is fit for food, and is tolerably sweet; it is round, and of the size of an apple. There are also other lilies, like roses, that grow in the river, the fruit of which is contained in a separate pod, that springs up from the root in form very much like a wasp's nest; in this there are many berries fit to be eaten, of the size of an olive stone, and they are eaten both fresh and dried. The byblus, an annual plant, is found in the fens. They cut off the top and put it to some other uses, but the lower part that is left, to the length of a cubit, they eat and sell. Those who are anxious to eat the byblus dressed in the most delicate manner, stew it in a hot pan and then eat it.
The Egyptians who live about the fens use an oil drawn from the fruit of the sillicypria, which they call cici: they plant and cultivate these sillicypria, which in Greece grow spontaneous and wild, on the banks of the rivers and lakes: under cultivation these bear an abundance of fruit, though of an offensive smell. Some bruise it and press out the oil; others boil and stew it, and collect the liquid that flows from it; this is fat, and no less suited for lamps than olive oil; but it emits a disgusting smell. They contrive in various ways to protect themselves from the mosquitoes, which are very abundant. Towers are of great service to those who inhabit the upper parts of the marshes; for the mosquitoes are prevented by the winds from flying high: but those who live round the marshes have contrived another expedient. Every man has a net, with which in the daytime he takes fish, and at night, in whatever bed he sleeps, he throws the net around it, and crawls in underneath; if he should wrap himself up in his clothes or in linen, the mosquitoes would bite through them, but they never attempt to bite through the net.