of between two and three thousand names of senators and knights was
drawn up. Seventeen were singled out for instant execution, and among
these seventeen was Cicero. He was staying at his home in Tusculum with
his brother Quintus when the news reached him. His first impulse was to
make for the sea-coast. If he could reach Macedonia, where Brutus had a
powerful army, he would, for a time at least, be safe. The two brothers
started. But Quintus had little or nothing with him, and was obliged to
go home to fetch some money. Cicero, who was himself but ill provided,
pursued his journey alone. Reaching the coast, he embarked. When it came
to the point of leaving Italy his resolution failed him. He had always
felt the greatest aversion for camp life. He had had an odious
experience of it when Pompey was struggling with Caesar for the mastery.
He would sooner die, he thought, than make trial of it again. He landed,
and traveled twelve miles towards Rome. Some afterwards said that he
still cherished hopes of being protected by Antony; others that it was
his purpose to make his way into the house of Octavius and kill himself
on his hearth, cursing him with his last breath, but that he was
deterred by the fear of being seized and tortured. Any how, he turned
back, and allowed his slaves to take him to Capua. The plan of taking
refuge with Brutus was probably urged upon him by his companions, who
felt that this gave the only chance of their own escape. Again he
embarked, and again he landed. Plutarch tells a strange story of a flock
of ravens that settled on the yardarms of his ship while he was on
board, and on the windows of the villa in which he passed the night. One
bird, he says, flew upon his couch and pecked at the cloak in which he
had wrapped himself. His slaves reproached themselves at allowing a
master, whom the very animals were thus seeking to help, to perish
before their eyes. Almost by main force they put him into his litter and
carried him toward the coast. Antony's soldiers now reached the villa,
the officer in command being an old client whom Cicero had successfully
defended on a charge of murder. They found the doors shut and burst them
open. The inmates denied all knowledge of their master's movements, till
a young Greek, one of his brother's freedmen, whom Cicero had taken a
pleasure in teaching, showed the officer the litter which was being
carried through the shrubbery of the villa to the sea. Taking with him