that you have in your
letters been usually inclined rather to check me and my hopes. Now pray
write distinctly what your view is. I know that I have fallen into this
distress from numerous errors of my own. If certain accidents have in
any degree corrected those errors, I shall be less sorry that I
preserved my life then and am still living. Owing to the constant
traffic along the road[329] and the daily expectation of political
change, I have as yet not removed from Thessalonica. But now I am being
forced away, not by Plancius--for he, indeed, wishes to keep me
here--but by the nature of the place, which is not at all calculated for
the residence of a disfranchised man in such a state of sorrow. I have
not gone to Epirus, as I had said I would, because all of a sudden the
messages and letters that arrived have all indicated it to be
unnecessary for me to be in the immediate neighbourhood of Italy. From
this place, as soon as I have heard something about the elections, I
shall set my face towards Asia, but to what particular part I am not yet
certain: however, you shall know.

Thessalonica, 21 July.

[Footnote 329: The _via Egnatia_, the road across Macedonia, which was
one of the great channels of communication between Rome and the East,
and which terminated at Thessalonica.]

LXX (A III, 13)

TO ATTICUS (AT ROME)

THESSALONICA, 5 AUGUST

[Sidenote: B.C. 58, AET. 48]

As to my having written you word that I meant to go to Epirus, I changed
my plan when I saw that my hope was vanishing and fading away, and did
not remove from Thessalonica. I resolved to remain there until I heard
from you on the subject mentioned in your last letter, namely, that
there was going to be some motion made in the senate on my case
immediately after the elections, and that Pompey had told you so.
Wherefore, as the elections are over and I have no letter from you, I
shall consider it as though you had written to say that nothing has come
of it, and I shall not feel annoyed at having been buoyed up by a hope
which did not keep me long in suspense. But the movement, which you said
in your letter that you foresaw as likely to be to my advantage, people
arriving here tell me will not occur.[330] My sole remaining hope is in
the tribunes-designate: and if I wait to see how that turns out, you
will have no reason to think of me as having been wanting to my own
cause or the wishes of my friends. As to your constantly finding fault
w