e
_palaestra_ rather highly; but, of course, the last thing I should wish
would be that Pomponia and her boy should live in fear of a falling
wall.

[Footnote 188: That is, if it ends in his death, for Meliodorus of
Skepsis was sent by Mithridates to Tigranes to urge him to go to war
with Rome, but privately advised him not to do so, and, in consequence,
was put to death by Mithridates (Plut. _Luc._ 22). The word _Scepsii_
([Greek: Skepsiou]) was introduced by Gronovius for the unintelligible
word _Syrpie_ found in the MSS., which so often blunder in Greek names.]

[Footnote 189: Clodius, alluding to his intrusion into the mysteries.]

[Footnote 190: Atticus has asked Cicero for a Latin treatise on
geography--probably as a publisher, Cicero being the prince of
book-makers--and to that end has sent him the Greek geography of
Serapio.]

[Footnote 191: In his Formianum or Pompeianum, his villas at Formiae and
Pompeii.]

[Footnote 192: An architect, a freedman of Cyrus, of whom we have heard
before.]

XXXI (A II, 5)

TO ATTICUS (AT ROME)

ANTIUM (APRIL)

[Sidenote: B.C. 59, AET. 47]

I wish very much, and have long wished, to visit Alexandria, and at the
same time to get away from here, where people are tired of me, and
return when they have begun to feel my loss--but at such a time and at
the bidding of such statesmen![193]

"I fear to face the men of Troy
And Trojan matrons with their trailing robes."[194]

For what would my friends the Optimates say--if there are such persons
left? That I had accepted a bribe to change my views?

"Polydamas the first would lay the charge."

I mean my friend Cato, who is as good as a hundred thousand in my eyes.
What, too, will history say of me six hundred years hence? I am much
more afraid of that than of the petty gossip of the men of to-day. But,
I think, I had better lie low and wait. For if it is really offered to
me, I shall be to a certain extent in a position of advantage, and then
will be the time to weigh the matter. There is, upon my word, a certain
credit even in refusing. Wherefore, if Theophanes[195] by chance has
consulted you on the matter, do not absolutely decline. What I am
expecting to hear from you is, what Arrius says, and how he endures
being left in the lurch,[196] and who are intended to be consuls--is it
Pompey and Crassus, or, as I am told in a letter, Servius Sulpicius with
Gabinius?--and whether there are any new laws o