CHAPTER IX.
CICERO'S CORRESPONDENCE.
I. ATTICUS.
It seems wonderful how, in the midst of all his work, Cicero found time to keep up such a voluminous correspondence. Something like eight hundred of his letters still remain to us, and there were whole volumes of them long preserved which are now lost,[1] to say nothing of the very many which may never have been thought worth preserving. The secret lay in his wonderful energy and activity. We find him writing letters before day-break, during the service of his meals, on his journeys, and dictating them to an amanuensis as he walked up and down to take needful exercise.
His correspondents were of almost all varieties of position and character, from Cæsar and Pompey, the great men of the day, down to his domestic servant
- ↑ Collections of his letters to Cæsar, Brutus, Cornelius Nepos the historian, Hirtius, Pansa, and to his son, are known to have existed.
