The Letters of Cicero Part 37

[Sidenote: B.C. 55, aeT. 51]

I should much like to know whether the tribunes are hindering the census by stopping business with their bad omens[530] (for there is a rumour to that effect), and what they are doing and contriving as to the censors.h.i.+p altogether. I have had an interview with Pompey here. He talked a good deal to me about politics. He is not at all satisfied with himself, to judge from what he says--one is obliged to put in that proviso in his case. He thinks very little of Syria as a province; talks a good deal about Spain--here, too, I must add, "to judge from what he says," and, I think, his whole conversation requires that reservation, and to be ticketed as Phocylides did his verses--?a? t?de F?????d??.[531] He expressed grat.i.tude to you for undertaking to arrange the statues:[532] towards myself he was, by Hercules, most effusively cordial. He even came to my c.u.man house to call on me.

However, the last thing he seemed to wish was that Messalla should stand for the consuls.h.i.+p: that is the very point on which I should like to hear what you know. I am much obliged by your saying that you will recommend my fame to Lucceius, and for your frequent inspection of my house. My brother Quintus has written to tell me that, as you have that dear boy, his son Quintus, staying with you, he intends coming to your house on the 7th of May. I left my c.u.man villa on the 26th of April.

That night I spent at Naples with Paetus. I write this very early on the 27th, on my road to my Pompeian house.

[Footnote 530: The tribunes had no _veto_ against the censors, they could only hinder them by the indirect method of _obnuntiatio_, declaring that the omens were bad, and so preventing business.]

[Footnote 531: This also is Phocylides's.]

[Footnote 532: In Pompey's new theatre.]

CXXII (Q FR II, 8)

TO HIS BROTHER QUINTUS (AT ROME)

c.u.mae (APRIL)

[Sidenote: B.C. 55, aeT. 51]

Afraid that you will interrupt me--you? In the first place, if I were as busy as you think, do you know what interruption means? Have you taken a lesson from Ateius?[533] So help me heaven, in my eyes you give _me_ a lesson in a kind of learning which I never enjoy unless you are with me.

Why, that you should talk to me, interrupt me, argue against me, or converse with me, is just what I should like. Nothing could be more delightful! Never, by Hercules, did any crazy poet read with greater zest his last composition than I listen to you, no matter what business is in hand, public or private, rural or urban. But it was all owing to my foolish scrupulousness that I did not carry you off with me when I was leaving town. You confronted me the first time with an unanswerable excuse--the health of my son: I was silenced. The second time it was both boys, yours and mine: I acquiesced.[534] Now comes a delightful letter, but with this drop of gall in it--that you seem to have been afraid, and still to be afraid, that you might bore me. I would go to law with you if it were decent to do so; but, by heaven! if ever I have a suspicion of such a feeling on your part, I can only say that I shall begin to be afraid of boring _you_ at times, when in your company. [I perceive that you have sighed at this. 'Tis the way of the world: "But if you lived on earth" ...I will never finish the quotation and say, "Away with all care!"[535] Marius,[536] again, I should certainly have forced into my sedan--I don't mean that famous one of Ptolemy that Anicius got hold of:[537] for I remember when I was conveying him from Naples to Baiae in Anicius's eight-bearer sedan, with a hundred armed guards in our train, I had a real good laugh when Marius, knowing nothing of his escort, suddenly drew back the curtains of the sedan--he was almost dead with fright and I with laughing; well, this same friend, I say, I should at least have carried off, too secure, at any rate, the delicate charm of that old-fas.h.i.+oned courtesy, and of a conversation which is the essence of culture. But I did not like to invite a man of weak health to a villa practically without a roof, and which even now it would be a compliment to describe as unfinished. It would indeed be a special treat to me to have the enjoyment of him here also. For I a.s.sure you that the neighbourhood of Marius makes the suns.h.i.+ne of that other country residence of mine.[538] I will see about getting him put up in the house of Anicius. For I myself, though a student, can live with workpeople in the house. I get this philosophy, not from Hymettus, but from Arpinum.[539] Marius is feebler in health and const.i.tution. As to interrupting my book[540]--I shall take from you just so much time for writing as you may leave me. I only hope you'll leave me none at all, that my want of progress may be set down to your encroachment rather than to my idleness! In regards to politics, I am sorry that you worry yourself too much, and are a better citizen than Philoctetes, who, on being wronged himself, was anxious for the very spectacle[541] that I perceive gives you pain. Pray hasten hither: I will console you and wipe all sorrow from your eyes: and, as you love me, bring Maruis. But haste, haste, both of you! There is a garden at my house.[542]

[Footnote 533: Some bore, unknown to us.]

[Footnote 534: The two boys seem to be receiving their education together at this time in the house of Quintus.]

[Footnote 535: It is all but impossible to explain these words. Some editors transfer them to the sentence after _de Republica_. But they are scarcely more in place there. The Greek quotation is not known.]

[Footnote 536: M. Marius, to whom Letter CXXVI is addressed.]

[Footnote 537: C. Anicius, a senator, seems to have obtained from Ptolemy Auletes, by gift or purchase, his state sedan and its attendants.]

[Footnote 538: The Pompeianum.]

[Footnote 539: An unintellible word, meant apparently for Greek (perhaps _arce_ ?????, see _Att._ xvi. 13), is in the text. The most probable conjecture refers it in some way to Arpinum, Cicero's hardy mountain birthplace.]

[Footnote 540: The _de Oratore_.]

[Footnote 541: The ruin of his country.]

[Footnote 542: For us to walk and converse in. It hardly refers to a supply of vegetables, as some suggest.]

CXXIII (A IV, 11)

TO ATTICUS (AT ROME)

c.u.mae (APRIL)

[Sidenote: B.C. 55, aeT. 51]

I was delighted with your two letters which I received together on the 26th. Go on with the story. I long to know all the facts of what you write about. Also I should like you to find out what this means: you can do so from Demetrius. Pompey told me that he was expecting Cra.s.sus in his Alban villa on the 27th: that as soon as he arrived, they were going at once to Rome to settle accounts with the _publicani_. I asked, "During the gladiatorial exhibitions?" He answered, "Before they were begun." What that means I wish you would send me word either at once, if you know, or when he has reached Rome. I am engaged here in devouring books with the aid of that wonderful fellow Dionysius,[543] for, by Hercules, that is what he seems to me to be. He sends compliments to you and all your party.

"No bliss so great as knowing all that is."

Wherefore indulge my thirst for knowledge by telling what happened on the first and on the second day of the shows: what about the censors,[544] what about Appius,[545] what about that she-Appuleius of the people?[546] Finally, pray write me word what you are doing yourself. For, to tell the truth, revolutions don't give me so much pleasure as a letter from you. I took no one out of town with me except Dionysius: yet I am in no fear of wanting conversation--so delightful do I find that youth. Pray give my book to Lucceius.[547] I send you the book of Demetrius of Magnesia,[548] that there may be a messenger on the spot to bring me back a letter from you.

[Footnote 543: A learned freedman of Atticus's.]

[Footnote 544: See p. 250. Censors were elected this year, but the powers of the censors.h.i.+p had been much curtailed by a law of Clodius in B.C. 58.]

[Footnote 545: Apius Claudius (brother of Clodius) was a candidate for the consuls.h.i.+p of B.C. 54.]

[Footnote 546: Clodius, a revolutionary, like Appuleius Saturninus. The feminine gender is an insult.]

[Footnote 547: Either his poem "On his own Times," or the notes of events which he had promised in Letter CVIII, p. 231.]

[Footnote 548: A treatise on union (pe?? ?????a?). The rhetorician Dionysius of Magnesia had been with Cicero during his tour in Asia.]

CXXIV (A IV, 12)

TO ATTICUS (AT ROME)

c.u.mae, APRIL

[Sidenote: B.C. 55, aeT. 51]

Egnatius[549] is at Rome. But I spoke strongly to him at Antium about Halimetus's business. He a.s.sured me that he would speak seriously to Aquilius.[550] You will see the man therefore, if you please. I think I can scarcely be ready for Macro:[551] for I see that the auction at Larinum is on the Ides and the two days following. Pray forgive me for that, since you think so much of Macro. But, as you love me, dine with me on the 2nd, and bring Pilia. You must absolutely do so. On the 1st I think of dining at Cra.s.sipes' suburban villa as a kind of inn. I thus elude the decree of the senate. Thence to my town house after dinner, so as to be ready to be at Milo's in the morning.[552] There, then, I shall see you, and shall march you on with me. My whole household sends you greeting.

[Footnote 549: L. Egnatius, who owed Q. Cicero money.]

[Footnote 550: C. Aquilius Gallus, Cicero's colleague in the praetors.h.i.+p, and a busy advocate. See p. 13.]

[Footnote 551: Apparently a money-lender.]

[Footnote 552: Perhaps at his _sponsalia_, as he was married towards the end of the year.]