true, but what did that matter to him? "It is as though
you were to say," replied I, "that I had been in disguise!" "What
business," quoth he, "has an Arpinate with hot baths?" "Say that to your
patron," said I, "who coveted the watering-place of an Arpinate."[102]
For you know about the marine villa. "How long," said he, "are we to put
up with this king?" "Do you mention a king," quoth I, "when Rex[103]
made no mention of you?" He, you know, had swallowed the inheritance of
Rex in anticipation. "You have bought a house," says he. "You would
think that he said," quoth I, "you have bought a jury." "They didn't
trust you on your oath," said he. "Yes," said I, "twenty-five jurors did
trust me, thirty-one didn't trust you, for they took care to get their
money beforehand." Here he was overpowered by a burst of applause and
broke down without a word to say.

My own position is this: with the loyalists I hold the same place as
when you left town, with the tagrag and bobtail of the city I hold a
much better one than at your departure. For it does me no harm that my
evidence appears not to have availed. Envy has been let blood without
causing pain, and even more so from the fact that all the supporters of
that flagitious proceeding confess that a perfectly notorious fact has
been hushed up by bribing the jury. Besides, the wretched starveling
mob, the blood-sucker of the treasury, imagines me to be high in the
favour of Magnus--and indeed we have been mutually united by frequent
pleasant intercourse to such an extent, that our friends the boon
companions of the conspiracy, the young chin-tufts, speak of him in
ordinary conversation as Gnaeus Cicero. Accordingly, both in the circus
and at the gladiatorial games, I received a remarkable ovation without a
single cat-call. There is at present a lively anticipation of the
elections, in which, contrary to everybody's wishes, our friend Magnus
is pushing the claims of Aulus's son;[104] and in that matter his
weapons are neither his prestige nor his popularity, but those by which
Philip said that any fortress could be taken--if only an ass laden with
gold could make its way up into it. Farthermore, that precious consul,
playing as it were second fiddle to Pompey,[105] is said to have
undertaken the business and to have bribery agents at his house, which I
don't believe. But two decrees have already passed the house of an
unpopular character, because they are thought to be directed again