and I don't suppose either
Cassius or Brutus was clear as to what it was all about either. It's
generally the way when friends fall out. It seems also that Brutus
thinks that Cassius refused to lend him a few quid to pay his legions,
and, you know, it's an unpardonable crime for one mate to refuse another
a few quid when he's in a hole; but it seems that the messenger was but
a fool who brought Cassius's answer back. It is generally the messenger
who is to blame, when friends make it up after a quarrel that was all
their own fault. Messengers had an uncomfortable time in those days, as
witness the case of the base slave who had to bring Cleopatra the news
of Antony's marriage with Octavia.

But the quarrel scene is great for its deep knowledge of the hearts of
men in matters of man to man--of man friend to man friend--and it is as
humanly simple as a barney between two old bush mates that threatens to
end in a bloody fist-fight and separation for life, but chances to end
in a beer. This quarrel threatened to end in the death of either Brutus
or Cassius or a set-to between their two armies, just at the moment
when they all should have been knit together against the forces of Mark
Antony and Octavius Caesar; but it ended in a beer, or its equivalent, a
bowl of wine.

Earlier in the quarrel, where Brutus asks why, after striking down the
foremost man in all the world for supporting land agents and others,
should they do the same thing and contaminate their fingers with base
bribes?

I'd rather be a dog and bay the moon,
Than such a Roman.

Cassius says:

Brutus, bait not me
I'll not endure it: you forget yourself,
To hedge me in; I am a soldier, I,
Older in practice, abler than yourself
To make conditions.

Brutus: Go to, you are not, Cassius.

Cassius: I am.

Brutus: I say you are not.

And so they get to it again until:

Cassius: Is it come to this?

Brutus: You say you are a better soldier:
Let it appear so; make your vaunting true,
And it shall please me well: for mine own part,
I shall be glad to learn of noble men.

Cassius: You wrong me every way; you wrong me, Brutus;
I said, an elder soldier, not a better.
Did I say better?

(What big boys they were--and what big boys we all are!)

Brutus: If you did, I car