it, I implore you to save from disfranchisement two unhappy men, who owe their loss of citizenship to fortune—which none can avoid—rather than to any fault of their own. Be so good as to allow me by your help to bestow this favour both on the men themselves, who are my friends, and also on the municipium of Cales, with which I have strong ties, and lastly upon Lepta, whom I regard more than all the rest. What I am going to say I think is not much to the point, yet, after all, there is no harm in saying it. The property of one of them is very small, of the other scarcely up to the equestrian standard. Wherefore, seeing that Cæsar, with his usual high-mindedness, has granted them their lives, and since there is very little else that can be taken from them, do secure these men their return, if you love me as much as I am sure you do. The only possible difficulty is the long journey; which their motive for not shirking is their desire to be with their families and to die at home. That you do your best and exert yourself, or rather that you carry it through—for as to your ability to do it I have no doubt—I strongly and repeatedly entreat you.
DXLIII (F XIII, 16)
CICERO TO CÆSAR (IN SPAIN)
Rome (February)
Of all our men of rank there is no one of whom I have
been fonder than of Publius Crassus the younger; and
though I have had very great hopes of him from his earliest
years, I began at once to entertain brilliant ideas of his abilities
when I was informed of your high opinion of him. His
freedman Apollonius I always valued and thought well of
even when Crassus was alive: for he was very attentive to
Crassus and extremely well suited to promote his best tastes:
and, accordingly, was much liked by him. But after the
death of Crassus he seemed the more worthy of admission
to my confidence and friendship, because he regarded it as
