ing. The shortness of money and the high
price of corn increased the exasperation. Nor will I omit the following:
the members of the colleges of the Capitolini and the Mercuriales[481]
expelled from their society a Roman knight named M. Furius Flaccus, a
man of bad character: the expulsion took place when he was at the
meeting, and though he threw himself at the feet of each member.

On the 6th of April, the eve of my departure from town, I gave a
betrothal party to Crassipes. That excellent boy, your and my Quintus,
was not at the banquet owing to a very slight indisposition. On the 7th
of April I visited Quintus and found him quite restored. He talked a
good deal and with great feeling about the quarrels between our wives.
What need I say more? Nothing could have been pleasanter. Pomponia,
however, had some complaints to make of you also: but of this when we
meet. After leaving your boy I went to the site of your house: the
building was going on with a large number of workmen. I urged the
contractor Longilius to push on. He assured me that he had every wish to
satisfy us. The house will be splendid, for it can be better seen now
than we could judge from the plan: my own house is also being built with
despatch. On this day I dined with Crassipes. After dinner I went in my
sedan to visit Pompey at his suburban villa. I had not been able to call
on him in the daytime as he was away from home. However, I wished to see
him, because I am leaving Rome to-morrow, and he is on the point of
starting for Sardinia. I found him at home and begged him to restore you
to us as soon as possible. "Immediately," he said. He is going to start,
according to what he said, on the 11th of April, with the intention of
embarking at Livorno or Pisa.[482] Mind, my dear brother, that, as soon
as he arrives, you seize the first opportunity of setting sail, provided
only that the weather is favourable. I write this on the 8th of April
before daybreak, and am on the point of starting on my journey, with the
intention of stopping to-day with Titus Titius at Anagnia. To-morrow I
think of being at Laterium,[483] thence, after five days in Arpinum,
going to my Pompeian house, just looking in upon my villa at Cumae on my
return journey, with the view--since Milo's trial has been fixed for the
7th of May--of being at Rome on the 6th, and of seeing you on that day,
I hope, dearest and pleasantest of brothers. I thought it best that the
building at Arcanum[4