m Rome to Interamna![151] Entered by night, did he? so he did
before! No one went to meet him? neither did anyone on the other
occasion, exactly when it should have been done! In short, I bring our
young upstart to his bearings, not only by a set and serious speech, but
also by repartees of this sort. Accordingly, I have come now to rally
him and jest with him in quite a familiar manner. For instance, when we
were escorting a candidate, he asked me "whether I had been accustomed
to secure Sicilians places at the gladiatorial shows?" "No," said I.
"Well, I intend to start the practice," said he, "as their new patron;
but my sister,[152] who has the control of such a large part of the
consul's space, wont give me more than a single foot." "Don't grumble,"
said I, "about one of your sister's feet; you may lift the other also."
A jest, you will say, unbecoming to a consular. I confess it, but I
detest that woman--so unworthy of a consul. For

"A shrew she is and with her husband jars,

and not only with Metellus, but also with Fabius,[153] because she is
annoyed at their interference in this business.[154] You ask about the
agrarian law: it has completely lost all interest, I think. You rather
chide me, though gently, about my intimacy with Pompey. I would not have
you think that I have made friends with him for my own protection; but
things had come to such a pass that, if by any chance we had quarrelled,
there would inevitably have been violent dissensions in the state. And
in taking precautions and making provision against that, I by no means
swerved from my well-known loyalist policy, but my object was to make
him more of a loyalist and induce him to drop somewhat of his
time-serving vacillation: and he, let me assure you, now speaks in much
higher terms of my achievements (against which many had tried to incite
him) than of his own. He testifies that while he served the state well,
I preserved it. What if I even make a better citizen of Caesar,[155] who
has now the wind full in his sails--am I doing so poor a service to the
Republic? Farthermore, if there was no one to envy me, if all, as they
ought to be, were my supporters, nevertheless a preference should still
be given to a treatment that would cure the diseased parts of the state,
rather than to the use of the knife. As it is, however, since the
knighthood, which I once stationed on the slope of the Capitoline,[156]
with you as their standard-bearer and leader