by your means. Farthermore, Licinius, who is known to you, a slave of my friend Æsopus, has run away. He has been at Athens, living in the house of Patron the Epicurean as a free man. Thence he has made his way to Asia. Afterwards a certain Plato of Sardis, who is often at Athens, and happened to be at Athens at the time that Licinius arrived there, having subsequently learnt by a letter from Æsopus that he was an escaped slave, arrested the fellow, and put him into confinement at Ephesus; but whether into the public prison, or into a slave mill, we could not clearly make out from his letter. But since he is at Ephesus, I should be obliged if you would trace him in any manner open to you, and with all care either [send him] or bring him home with you. Don't take into consideration the fellow's value: such a good-for-nothing is worth very little; but Æsopus is so much vexed at his slave's bad conduct and audacity, that you can do him no greater favour than by being the means of his recovering him.
Now for the news that you chiefly desire. We have so completely lost the constitution that Cato,[295] a young man of no sense, but yet a Roman citizen and a Cato, scarcely got off with his life because, having determined to prosecute Gabinius for bribery, when the prætors could not be approached for several days, and refused to admit anyone to their presence, he mounted the rostra in public meeting and called Pompey an "unofficial dictator." No one ever had a narrower escape of being killed. From this you may see the state of the whole Republic. People, however, shew no inclination to desert my cause. They make wonderful professions, offers of service, and promises: and, indeed, I have the highest hopes and even greater spirit--so that I hope to get the better in the struggle, and feel confident in my mind that, in the present state of the Republic, I need not fear even an accident. However, the matter stands thus: if Clodius gives notice of an action against me, the whole of Italy will rush to my support, so that I shall come off with many times greater glory than before; but if he attempts the use of violence, I hope, by the zeal not only of friends but also of opponents, to be able to meet force with force. All promise me the aid of themselves, their friends, clients, freedmen, slaves, and, finally, of their money. Our old regiment of loyalists is warm in its zeal and attachment to me. If there were any who had formerly been comparatively hostile or lukewarm, they are now uniting themselves with the loyalists from hatred to these despots. Pompey makes every sort of promise, and so does Cæsar: but my confidence in them is not enough to induce me to drop any of my preparations. The tribunes-designate are friendly to us. The consuls-designate make excellent professions. Some of the new prætors are very friendly and very brave citizens--Domitius, Nigidius, Memmius, Lentulus[296]--the others are loyalists also, but these are eminently so. Wherefore keep a good heart and high hopes. However, I will keep you constantly informed on particular events as they occur from day to day.
[Footnote 285: ἀλλ' αἰεί τινα φῶτα μέγαν καὶ καλὸν ἐδέγμην, "but I ever expected some big and handsome man" (Hom. _Odyss._ ix. 513). Statius had been manumitted by Quintus Cicero, and there had been much talk about it, as we have already heard. See XLIV, p. 109, and XLV, p. 111.]
[Footnote 286: Reading _quam pro civitate sua_ for _prope quam civitatem suam_. I think _prope_ and _pro_ (_pr_) might easily have been mistaken for each other, and if the order of _quam_ and _pro_ (mistaken for _prope_) were once changed, the case of _civitate_ would follow. Prof.
Tyrrell, who writes the town _Blandus_, would read _molliorem_ for _nobiliorem_, and imagines a pun on the meaning of _Blandus_. But the name of the town seems certainly _Blaundus_, Βλαῦνδος, or Μλαῦνδος (Stephanus, Βλαῦδος); see Head, _Hist. Num._ p. 559: and Cicero, though generally punning on names, would hardly do so here, where he is making a grave excuse.]
[Footnote 287: Whom he called (Letter XXIX) "a madman and a knave."]
[Footnote 288: C. Vergilius Balbus, proprætor in Sicily (_pro Planc._ § 95; Letter XXIX). C. Octavius (father of Augustus), in Macedonia (see p.
78). L. Marcius Philippus was proprætor of Syria B.C. 61-59. The governor of Cilicia in the same period is not known; probably some one left in charge by Pompey.]
[Footnote 289: I have endeavoured to leave the English as ambiguous as the Latin. Cicero may mean that he has done some good, for at the end of Letter XXIX he says that Quintus has improved in these points, and had been better in his second than in his first year. On the other hand, the context here seems rather to point to the meaning "how _little_ good I have done!"--impatiently dismissing the subject of temper.]
[Footnote 290: These "requisitionary letters" were granted by a provincial governor to certain persons requiring supplies, payment of debts, or legal decisions in their favour in the provinces, or other privileges, and, if carelessly granted, were open to much abuse. Cicero, in his own government of Cilicia, boasted that he had signed none such in six months. The ill-wishers of Quintus had apparently got hold of a number of these letters signed by him (having been first written out by the suitors themselves and scarcely glanced at by him), and a selection of them published to prove his injustice or carelessness.]
[Footnote 291: The governor of a province would stand in such a matter in the place of the prætor in Rome, _i.e._, he would decide on questions of law, not of fact, as, whether a debt was due or not. However, Quintus perhaps only erred in the form of his injunction. He might forbid the deceased's estate being touched till the question of Fundanius's debt was decided; but in his letter he assumed (as he had no right to do) that the claim was good. Substantially it seems to me that Quintus was right, and certainly in his appeal to him Cicero does not follow his own injunction to disregard personal feelings.]
[Footnote 292: ὀρθὰν τὰν ναῦν. Quintus had written, it seems, defiantly about the slanders afloat against him, and had quoted two Greek proverbial sayings. The first is found in Stobæus, 108 (extract from Teles): "It was a fine saying of the pilot, 'At least, Poseidon, a ship well trimmed,'" _i.e._, if you sink my ship, she shall at least go down with honour. Quintus means, "Whatever my enemies may do afterwards, I will keep my province in a sound state as long as I am here."]
[Footnote 293: ἅπαξ θανεῖν, perhaps "Better to die once for all than give in to every unjust demand." The editors quote Æschylus, _Pr. V._ 769: κρεῖσσον γὰρ εἰσάπαξ θανεῖν ἢ θὰς ἁπάσας ἡμέρας πάσχειν κακῶς.
But I don't feel sure that this is the passage alluded to.]
[Footnote 295: Gaius Cato, tribune B.C. 56.]
[Footnote 296: L. Domitius Ahenobarbus, who as prætor threatened Cæsar with impeachment, and as consul (B.C. 54) tried to get him recalled. He was, in 50-49, appointed Cæsar's successor in Gaul, defended Marseilles against him, and eventually fell in the battle of Pharsalia. P. Nigidius Figulus supported Cicero during the Catiline conspiracy. Gaius Memmius, ædile B.C. 60 (see p. 51). Lucretius dedicated his poem to him. L.
Cornelius Lentulus Crus, consul B.C. 49, accused Clodius in B.C. 61, murdered in Africa after Pompey, B.C. 48.]
LIII (F XIII, 42) TO L. CULLEOLUS (IN ILLYRICUM) ROME[297] My friend L. Lucceius,[298] the most delightful fellow in the world, has expressed in my presence amazingly warm thanks to you, saying that you have given most complete and liberal promises to his agents. Since your words have roused such gratitude in him, you may imagine how grateful he will be for the thing itself, when, as I hope, you will have performed your promise. In any case the people of Bullis have shewn that they intend to do Lucceius right according to the award of Pompey. But we have very great need of the additional support of your wishes, influence, and prætorian authority. That you should give us these I beg you again and again. And this will be particularly gratifying to me, because Lucceius's agents know, and Lucceius himself gathered from your letter to him, that no one's influence has greater weight with you than mine. I ask you once more, and reiterate my request, that he may find that to be the case by practical experience.
[Footnote 297: There is no direct means of dating these letters, as we have no other information as to the proconsulship of Culleolus.
Illyricum was not always a separate government, but was sometimes under the governor of Macedonia, sometimes under the governor of Gaul. The indications of date are (1) Pompey is at home and often seen by Cicero, therefore it is not between the spring of B.C. 67 and the end of 62; (2) it is not later than March, B.C. 58, because from that time for ten years Cæsar was governor of Illyricum, and before he ceased to be so Pompey had left Italy, never to return. Even if Culleolus was not governor of Illyricum, but of Macedonia, the same argument holds good, for C. Antonius was in Macedonia B.C. 63-60, and Octavius from B.C. 60 to March, B.C. 59. That is, Culleolus could not have been in Macedonia while Pompey was in Italy till after March, B.C. 59.]
[Footnote 298: L. Lucceius, whom we have heard of before as a candidate for the consulship with Cæsar, and whom we shall hear of again as the author of a history of the social and civil wars (Sulla and Marius), and as being asked to write on Cicero's consulship. He was a close friend of Pompey, and took his side in B.C. 49 (Cæs. _B. C._ iii. 18). The people of Bullis owed Lucceius money, and Cicero asks for "mandatory letters" from Culleolus to get it.]
LIV (F XIII, 41) TO L. CULLEOLUS (IN ILLYRICUM) ROME In what you have done for the sake of L. Lucceius, I wish you to be fully aware that you have obliged a man who will be exceedingly grateful; and that, while this is very much the case with Lucceius himself, so also Pompey as often as he sees me--and he sees me very often--thanks you in no common terms. I add also, what I know will be exceedingly gratifying to you, that I am myself immensely delighted with your kindness to Lucceius. For the rest, though I have no doubt that as you acted before for my sake, so now, for the sake of your own consistency, you will abide by your liberal intentions, yet I reiterate my request to you with all earnestness, that what you first gave us reason to hope, and then actually carried out, you would be so good as to see extended and brought to a final completion by your means. I assure you, and I pledge my credit to it, that such a course will be exceedingly gratifying to both Lucceius and Pompey, and that you will be making a most excellent investment with them. About politics, and about the business going on here, and what we are all thinking about, I wrote to you in full detail a few days ago, and delivered the letter to your servants. Farewell.
LETTERS IN EXILE [Sidenote: B.C. 58. Coss., L. Piso, A. Gabinius.]
We have no record in Cicero's correspondence of the final measures taken by Clodius against him. We find him when the correspondence for this year opens on his way to exile: all his boasts of staying and fighting have been thrown to the winds. Clodius, indeed, had not simply done what Cicero expected at the worst--impeached him.
He had gone more systematically to work. Among other measures calculated to win popularity, he proposed a modification of the _lex Ælia Fufia_, declaring it illegal for a magistrate to stop legislative _comitia_ by "watching the sky." Thus freed from one hindrance, he next proposed and carried a law for the prosecution of any magistrate who had put a citizen to death without trial (_qui indemnatos cives necavisset_). Cicero at once recognized his danger: if the people voted this law, a jury could scarcely fail to condemn. The triumvirs would do nothing. Pompey, after all his promises, avoided seeing Cicero as much as possible: Cæsar offered him a _legatio_ again; and though he spoke against giving the law a retrospective effect, he could not consistently object to the law itself, and shewed no sign of desiring to shelter Cicero, except on his consenting to leave Rome. Cicero then adopted the course which was open to all citizens threatened with a prosecution--that of going away from Rome--and started apparently with the view of going to Malta. Whether it was wise or not, Cicero afterwards lamented having taken this course, and thought that he had better have braved the danger and stood his trial. It at any rate facilitated the next move of Clodius, who proposed and carried a bill forbidding Cicero "fire and water" within 500 (afterwards reduced to 400) miles of Italy, and confiscating his property. Accordingly, Cicero had to go much farther than he had intended. He crossed from Brundisium to Dyrrachium, and proceeded along the _via Egnatia_ to its terminus at Thessalonica, where he spent the autumn, B.C. 58.
In November, B.C. 58, he returned to Dyrrachium, ready for the recall which he heard was imminent. Meanwhile his town house was destroyed, its site made a _templum_, and a statue of Liberty set up in it, and his villas at Tusculum and Antium dismantled. The dangers of his position are not exaggerated in his letters, and may account for much of their melancholy tone. He had lost the protection of the laws, and any one of his many enemies meeting him might have killed him with practical impunity. He seems to have left Rome in April.
LV (A III, 3) TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) VIBO, APRIL I hope I may see the day when I shall thank you for having compelled me to remain alive! At present I thoroughly repent it. But I beg you to come and see me at Vibo at once, to which town I have for several reasons directed my journey.[299] But if you will only come there, I shall be able to consult you about my entire journey and exile. If you don't do so, I shall be surprised, but I feel sure you will.
[Footnote 299: Mod. _Monte Leone_, on the road to Rhegium, from which at this time Cicero meant to cross to Sicily, and thence to Malta.]
LVI (A III, 2) TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) NARES LUCANÆ,[300] APRIL The reason for having come this journey is that there was no place where I could be independent except on Sica's estate,[301] especially till the bill is emended,[302] and at the same time because I find that from this spot I can reach Brundisium, if you were only with me, but without you I cannot stay in those parts owing to Autronius.[303] At present, as I said in my previous letter, if you will come to me, we shall be able to form a plan for the whole business. I know the journey is troublesome, but the whole calamity is full of troubles. I cannot write more, I am so heart-broken and dejected. Take care of your health.
From Nares Lucanæ, 8 April.
[Footnote 300: Nares Lucanæ (_Monte Nero_), near the River Silarus, and on the _via Popilia_ (south-western branch of the _Appia_). Cicero has therefore come north again from Vibo, having given up the idea of Rhegium and Sicily, and making for Beneventum, and so by the _via Appia_ for Brundisium.]
[Footnote 301: A friend of Cicero's, of whose death at Brundisium we [Footnote 302: The bill originally named 500 miles as the distance from Italy. Before passing it had to be put up in public three weeks (_trinundinæ_), and meanwhile might be amended, and was amended to 400.]
[Footnote 303: P. Autronius Pætus, one of Catiline's confederates, who would injure Cicero if he could. Cicero would not be able to reach Epirus without coming within his reach; for he had been condemned for _ambitus_, and was in exile there or in Achaia. _Illas partes_=Epirus.]
LVII (A III, 4) TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) NEAR VIBO, APRIL I hope you will attribute my sudden departure from Vibo, whither I had asked you come, to my unhappiness rather than to fickleness. A copy of the bill for my ruin was brought to me, in which the correction of which I had been told was to the effect that I might legally remain anywhere beyond 400 miles. Since I was not allowed to go yonder,[304] I set out towards Brundisium before the day for carrying the bill had come, both to prevent Sica, in whose house I was staying, from being ruined,[305] and because I was prevented from residing at Malta. So now make haste to catch me up, if only I shall find any welcome there.[306] At present I receive kind invitations. But about the rest of my journey I am nervous.
Truly, my dear Pomponius, I am very sorry I consented to live: in which matter you exercised the chief influence with me. But of these things when we meet. Only be sure and come.
[Footnote 304: To Malta. The proprætor of Sicily, C. Vergilius, opposed his going to Malta, which was in the province of Sicily, though it had a [Footnote 305: Because of entertaining the condemned man, a special proviso in this law (Dio, xxxviii. 17).]
[Footnote 306: In Epirus, believing that Atticus will understand that his going to Brundisium means that he will go to Epirus: and as Atticus lives there, he naturally asks him to come to meet him. Epirus was, for certain purposes at least, in the province of Macedonia, and it depended on the governor, L. Appuleius Saturninus, what reception he would meet.
His friend Plancius was quæstor.]
LVIII (A III, 1) TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) FROM THE NEIGHBOURHOOD OF THURIUM, ON THE WAY TO BRUNDISIUM, APRIL I always thought that it was of great importance to me that you should be with me: but when I read the bill, then, indeed, I understood that there could be nothing more desirable for me than that you should overtake me as soon as possible, in order that, if after quitting Italy I should have to travel through Epirus, I might avail myself of your protection and that of your friends; or, if I had to adopt any other plan, I might come to some definite resolution in accordance with your opinion. Wherefore I beg you to do your best to overtake me promptly, which will be easier for you to do since the law about the province of Macedonia has now been passed.[307] I would urge you at greater length were it not that with you facts speak for me.
[Footnote 307: One of Clodius's concessions to the consuls, to keep them quiet, was to get Macedonia assigned by a _lex_ to L. Calpurnius Piso.
As Atticus lived in what was practically part of the province, and had much business there, it was important to him to be on the spot, and try to influence the choice of a governor. That being over, he would not have so much to detain him in Rome.]
LIX (A III, 5) TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) THURIUM, 10 APRIL Terentia thanks you frequently and very warmly. That is a great comfort to me. I am the most miserable man alive, and am being worn out with the most poignant sorrow. I don't know what to write to you. For if you are at Rome, it is now too late for you to reach me; but if you are on the road, we shall discuss together all that needs to be discussed when you have overtaken me. All I ask you is to retain the same affection for me, since it was always myself you loved. For I am the same man: my enemies have taken what was mine, they have not taken myself. Take care of your health.
From Thurium, 10 April.
LX (A III, 6) TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) ON THE WAY TO TARENTUM, 18 APRIL I had felt certain of seeing you at Tarentum or Brundisium, and that was of importance to me in many respects: among others, as to my being able to stay in Epirus and consult you about the future. My disappointment in this is only another item in the long list of my misfortunes.[308] I mean to go to Asia, to Cyzicus for choice. I commend my family to you. I am very wretched and can scarcely support my life.
From near Tarentum, 17 April.
[Footnote 308: We suppose that Cicero has heard from Atticus that he is not going to be at Tarentum or Brundisium, for he writes before arriving at either.]
LXI (F XIV, 4) TO TERENTIA, TULLIOLA, AND YOUNG CICERO (AT ROME) BRUNDISIUM, 29 APRIL Yes, I do write to you less often than I might, because, though I am always wretched, yet when I write to you or read a letter from you, I am in such floods of tears that I cannot endure it. Oh, that I had clung less to life! I should at least never have known real sorrow, or not much of it, in my life. Yet if fortune has reserved for me _any_ hope of recovering at any time any position again, I was not utterly wrong to do so: if these miseries are to be permanent, I only wish, my dear, to see you as soon as possible and to die in your arms, since neither gods, whom you have worshipped with such pure devotion, nor men, whom I have ever served, have made us any return. I have been thirteen days at Brundisium in the house of M. Lænius Flaccus, a very excellent man, who has despised the risk to his fortunes and civil existence in comparison to keeping me safe, nor has been induced by the penalty of a most iniquitous law to refuse me the rights and good offices of hospitality and friendship. May I some time have the opportunity of repaying him!
Feel gratitude I always shall. I set out from Brundisium on the 29th of April,[309] and intend going through Macedonia to Cyzicus. What a fall!
What a disaster! What can I say? Should I ask you to come--a woman of weak health and broken spirit? Should I refrain from asking you? Am I to be without you, then? I think the best course is this: if there is any hope of my restoration, stay to promote it and push the thing on: but if, as I fear, it proves hopeless, pray come to me by any means in your power. Be sure of this, that if I have you I shall not think myself wholly lost. But what is to become of my darling Tullia? You must see to that now: I can think of nothing. But certainly, however things turn out, we must do everything to promote that poor little girl's married happiness and reputation. Again, what is my boy Cicero to do? Let him, at any rate, be ever in my bosom and in my arms.[310] I can't write more. A fit of weeping hinders me. I don't know how you have got on; whether you are left in possession of anything, or have been, as I fear, entirely plundered. Piso, as you say, I hope will always be our friend.
As to the manumission of the slaves you need not be uneasy. To begin with, the promise made to yours was that you would treat them according as each severally deserved. So far Orpheus has behaved well, besides him no one very markedly so. With the rest of the slaves the arrangement is that, if my property is forfeited, they should become my freedmen, supposing them to be able to maintain at law that status.[311] But if my property remained in my ownership, they were to continue slaves, with the exception of a very few. But these are trifles. To return to your advice, that I should keep up my courage and not give up hope of recovering my position, I only wish that there were any good grounds for entertaining such a hope. As it is, when, alas! shall I get a letter from you? Who will bring it me? I would have waited for it at Brundisium, but the sailors would not allow it, being unwilling to lose a favourable wind. For the rest, put as dignified a face on the matter as you can, my dear Terentia. Our life is over: we have had our day: it is not any fault of ours that has ruined us, but our virtue. I have made no false step, except in not losing my life when I lost my honours. But since our children preferred my living, let us bear everything else, however intolerable. And yet I, who encourage you, cannot encourage myself. I have sent that faithful fellow Clodius Philhetærus home, because he was hampered with weakness of the eyes. Sallustius seems likely to outdo everybody in his attentions. Pescennius is exceedingly kind to me; and I have hopes that he will always be attentive to you.
Sica had said that he would accompany me; but he has left Brundisium.
Take the greatest possible care of your health, and believe me that I am more affected by your distress than my own. My dear Terentia, most faithful and best of wives, and my darling little daughter, and that last hope of my race, Cicero, good-bye!
29 April, from Brundisium.
[Footnote 309: Reading _prid. Kal._ instead of _a. d. II. Kal._, which Tyrrell calls _audacius_ in Schutz. But absolute nonsense is not to be kept even for a MS.
(1) Cicero says that he has been thirteen days at Brundisium. In the next letter he tells Atticus he arrived on the 17th. That, in the Roman way of counting, brings it to _prid._ (29th).
(2) Either the date at the end of the letter is wrong, or _prid._ must be used here (3) There is no such date properly as _a. d. II. Kal._ The day before In regard to dates we must remember that Cicero is using the præ-Julian calendar, in which all months, except February, March, May, July, and October, had twenty-nine days. These last four had thirty-one and February twenty-eight.]
[Footnote 310: Cicero does not mean that young Marcus is to come to him at once, but that, when Tullia's marriage portion is settled, Terentia is to bring him with her if she comes. Really he didn't mean any of them to come, at any rate for a long while. Piso is Tullia's husband.]
[Footnote 311: If Cicero's property was confiscated, it might be held that the slaves went with it, and would be sold with it, and that his manumission of them was an evasion, which could not hold good at law. If his property was not confiscated, they were to remain in their status as slaves. See Letter CXCII.]
LXII (A III, 7) TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) BRUNDISIUM, 29 APRIL I arrived at Brundisium on the 17th of April. On that day your slaves delivered me your letter, and some other slaves, on the next day but one, brought me another. As to your invitation and advice to stay at your house in Epirus, your kindness is most gratifying, and far from being a novelty. It is a plan that would have exactly suited my wishes, if I might have spent all my time there: for I loathe a crowd of visitors, I can scarcely bear the light, and that solitude, especially in a spot so familiar, would have been the reverse of disagreeable. But to put up there as a mere stage in my journey! In the first place it is far out of my way, and in the next it is only four days from Autronius and the rest, and in the third place you are not there. Had I been going to reside permanently, a fortified castle would have been an advantage, but to one only passing through it is unnecessary. Why, if I had not been afraid, I should have made for Athens[312]--there were circumstances that made me much wish to go--but as it is, I have enemies in the neighbourhood, you are not there, and I fear they[313] might hold even that town not to be the legal distance from Italy, nor do you mention by what day I am to expect you. As to your urging me to remain alive, you carry one point--that I should not lay violent hands upon myself: the other you cannot bring to pass--that I should not regret my policy and my continuance in life. For what is there to attach me to it, especially if the hope which accompanied me on my departure is non-existent? I will not attempt to enumerate all the miseries into which I have fallen through the extreme injustice and unprincipled conduct, not so much of my enemies, as of those who were jealous of me, because I do not wish to stir up a fresh burst of grief in myself, or invite you to share the same sorrow. I say this deliberately--that no one was ever afflicted with so heavy a calamity, that no one had ever greater cause to wish for death; while I have let slip the time when I might have sought it most creditably. Henceforth death can never heal, it can only end my sorrow.[314] In politics I perceive that you collect all circumstances that you think may inspire me with a hope of a change: and though they are insignificant, yet, since you will have it so, let us have patience. In spite of what you say, you will catch us up if you make haste. For I will either come into Epirus to be near you, or I will travel slowly through Candavia.[315] My hesitation about Epirus is not caused by vacillation on my part, but by the fact that I do not know where I am likely to see my brother. As to him, I neither know how I am to see him, nor how I shall let him go. That is the greatest and most distressing of all my distresses. I would indeed have written to you oftener, and at greater length, had it not been that sorrow, while it has affected all parts of my intellect, has above all entirely destroyed my faculty for this kind of writing. I long to see you. Take care of your health.
Brundisium, 29 April.
[Footnote 312: He means that had it not been for enemies in Greece and Epirus, he should not only have gone as far south as Epirus, but farther--to Athens. There is a good deal to be said for Schutz's reading, _Achaiam_ for _Athenas_, but as the MS. reading can be explained, it is safer to keep it.]
[Footnote 313: The Clodian party at Rome. "That town" is Athens.]
[Footnote 314: "I have lost my chance of dying with honour; henceforth death may end my grief, but cannot heal my damaged reputation." _Reliqua tempora_, _i.e._, other opportunities of suicide.]
[Footnote 315: A mountain range in Illyria, over which the _via Egnatia_ passes (mod. _Elbassán_).]
LXIII (A III, 8) TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) THESSALONICA, 29 MAY I wrote to you at Brundisium, when on the point of starting, the reasons for my not going to Epirus: namely, the proximity of Achaia, which was full of enemies of the most unscrupulous character, and secondly, the difficulty of leaving it when I wished to resume my journey. Added to this, while I was at Dyrrachium two messages reached me: the first, that my brother was coming from Ephesus to Athens by ship; the second, that he was coming through Macedonia by land. Accordingly, I sent a message to meet him at Athens, telling him to come thence to Thessalonica. I myself continued my journey, and arrived at Thessalonica on the 23rd of May, but have no certain intelligence about his journey except that he had left Ephesus some time ago. At present I am feeling very nervous as to what steps are being taken at Rome. Although you say in one of your letters, dated the 15th of May, that you hear that he will be vigorously prosecuted, in another you say that things are calming down. But then the latter is dated a day before the former; which makes me all the more anxious. So while my own personal sorrow is every day tearing my heart and wearing out my strength, this additional anxiety indeed scarcely leaves me any life at all. However, the voyage itself was very difficult, and he perhaps, being uncertain where I was, has taken some other course. For my freedman Phaetho saw nothing of him. Phaetho was driven by the wind from Ilium[316] to Macedonia, and met me at Pella.
How formidable other circumstances are I am fully aware, and I don't know what to say to you. I fear everything, nor is there any misery which would not seem possible in my present unfortunate position.
Miserable as I still am in the midst of my heavy trials and sorrows, now that this anxiety is added to them, I remain at Thessalonica in a state of suspense without venturing upon any step whatever.
Now to answer you. I have not seen Cæcilius Trypho. I comprehend from your letter what you and Pompey have been saying. That any movement in politics is impending I cannot see as clearly as you either see, or perhaps only suggest for my consolation. For, as the case of Tigranes was passed over, all hope of a rupture is at an end.[317] You bid me thank Varro: I will do so; also Hypsæus.[318] As to your advice not to go farther off till the _acta_[319] of the month of May reach me, I think I shall do as you suggest. But where to stay? I have not yet come to any decision. And indeed my mind is so uneasy about Quintus, that I can determine on nothing. However, I will let you know immediately. From the incoherent nature of my letters I think you will understand the agitation of my mind, caused not so much by my misery, though I have been overwhelmed by an incredible and unparalleled calamity, as by the recollection of my blunder. For by whose unprincipled advice I was egged on and betrayed you certainly now perceive,[320] and oh that you had perceived it before, and had not given your whole mind to lamentation along with me! Wherefore, when you are told that I am prostrate and unmanned with grief, consider that I am more distressed at my own folly than at the result of it, in having believed a man whom I did not think to be treacherous. My writing is impeded both by the recollection of my own disasters, and by my alarm about my brother. Yes, pray look after and direct all the affairs you mention. Terentia expresses the warmest gratitude to you. I have sent you a copy of the letter which I have written to Pompey.
Thessalonica, 29 May.
[Footnote 316: Reading _ab Ilio_ with Madvig for _ab illo_.]
[Footnote 317: Tigranes, a son of the king of Armenia, was brought to Rome by Pompey to adorn his triumph, and put under the care of Lucius Flavius. This prince was, for a bribe, released by Clodius by a trick, and the attempt to get him away led to a scuffle in which lives were lost. Pompey regarded this as a slight upon himself, and his partisan, the consul Gabinius, attempted to prevent it. But both were hustled in the forum and treated with insults. The hope of a breach in the triumvirate arose from the supposition that Clodius had the support of Cæsar in his high-handed proceeding (Dio, xxxviii. 30; Plut. _Pomp._ 48; Ascon. 47).]
[Footnote 318: P. Plautius Hypsæus, who had been Pompey's quæstor and on intimate terms with him. He had been, it seems, interesting himself on Cicero's behalf.]
[Footnote 319: The gazette of public transactions and measures passed in the senate, which was sent round to the provinces. We shall hear of it again.]
[Footnote 320: The next letter shews that he means Hortensius. The blunder which he complains of having committed, by the advice of Hortensius, is that of having left Rome, rather than stay and brave the impeachment.]
LXIV (A III, 9) TO ATTICUS (AT ROME) THESSALONICA, 13 JUNE My brother Quintus having quitted Asia before the 1st of May, and