orities for this period.

(1.) Suetonius (_Caes. 20_) appears to attribute the instigation of
Vettius to Caesar, as also the murder of Vettius in prison, after he
broke down so flagrantly. The text of this passage, however, is somewhat
doubtful.

(2.) Appian (_B. C._ ii. 12) describes the scene as happening at the
time that Caesar's agrarian law was being passed, and Bibulus was hustled
in the forum. Vettius, with a drawn dagger, rushed into the crowd crying
out that he had been sent by Bibulus, Cicero, and Cato to assassinate
Caesar and Pompey, and that an attendant of Bibulus had given him the
dagger. Vettius was arrested, put into prison to be questioned the next
day, and was murdered during the night. Caesar meanwhile addressed the
people and excited their anger; but after the death of Vettius the
matter was hushed up.

(3.) Plutarch (_Lucull._ 42) says that the "Pompeians," annoyed at
finding the union with Caesar opposed by the leading Optimates, induced
Vettius to accuse Lucullus and others of a plot to assassinate Pompey;
and that the corpse of Vettius shewed evident signs of violence.

(4.) Dio Cassius (38-39) says bluntly that Vettius was employed by
Lucullus and Cicero to assassinate Pompey, and was got rid of in prison.
He adds that Vettius was discredited by bringing in the name of Bibulus,
who (as Cicero also says) had secured himself by giving Pompey warning.

The conclusions seem to be (though in such a tangled skein of lies it is
impossible to be sure), (1) that there was no plot, properly so called,
though many of the Optimates, and Cicero among them, had used incautious
language; (2) that Vettius was suborned by some person or party of
persons to make the people believe that there was one; (3) that
Caesar--though there is not sufficient evidence to shew that he had been
the instigator--was willing to take advantage of the prejudice created
by the suspicions thus aroused; (4) that though Vettius had served
Cicero in his capacity of spy in the days of the Catilinarian
conspiracy, and was able to report words of his sufficiently
characteristic, yet this letter to Atticus exonerates Cicero from
suspicion, even if there were a plot, and even if we could believe that
he could have brought himself to plot the death of Pompey.

APPENDIX C

The following letters to Tiro, with one from Quintus in regard to
his manumission, are given here because of the difficulty of dating
them. T