ur of dedicating the restored Capitoline temple, and beat him in the
election of Pontifex Maximus.]

[Footnote 278: Servilia, mother of Brutus, was reported to be Caesar's
mistress. As Cicero is insinuating that the whole affair was got up by
Caesar to irritate Pompey with the _boni_, this allusion will be
understood.]

[Footnote 279: If Vettius did say this, he at any rate successfully
imitated Cicero's manner. These names are always in his mouth. See 2
_Phil._ Sec.Sec. 26, 87; _pro Mil._. Sec.Sec. 8, 82, etc. For a farther discussion
of Vettius, see Appendix B.]

[Footnote 280: Probably a praetor, not the triumvir.]

[Footnote 281: Q. Considius Gallus, who, according to Plutarch (_Caes._
13), said in the senate that the attendance of senators was small
because they feared a massacre. "What made you come, then?" said Caesar.
"My age," he replied; "I have little left to lose."]

LI (A II, 25)

TO ATTICUS (IN EPIRUS)

ROME (JULY OR AUGUST)

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

When I have praised any one of your friends to you I should like you
tell him that I have done so. For instance, you know I lately wrote to
you about Varro's kindness to me, and that you wrote me back word that
the circumstance gave you the greatest delight. But I should have
preferred your writing to him and saying that he was doing all I could
expect--not because he was, but in order that he might do so. For he is
a man of astonishing whims, as you know, "tortuous and no
wise----."[282] But I stick to the rule "Follies of those in power,"
etc.[283] But, by Hercules, that other friend of yours, Hortalus--with
what a liberal hand, with what candour, and in what ornate language has
he praised me to the skies, when speaking of the praetorship of Flaccus
and that incident of the Allobroges.[284] I assure you nothing could
have been more affectionate, complimentary, or more lavishly expressed.
I very much wish that you would write and tell him that I sent you word
of it. Yet why write? I think you are on your way and are all but here.
For I have urged you so strongly to come in my previous letters. I am
expecting you with great impatience, longing for you very much; nor do I
call for you more than circumstances themselves and the state of the
times. Nothing can be more desperate than the position of politics,
nothing more unpopular than the authors of it, I--as I think, hope, and
imagine--am safe behind a rampart of goodwill of the stronges