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of Otho, I do not think we shall have any competitor. But you will be able to influence him personally: you could have done so still more easily if you had had Canus with you. What vulgar gluttony! I am ashamed of his father.[1] Write by return if you want to say anything.



DCVII (A XIII, 30)

TO ATTICUS (AT ROME)

Tusculum, 28 May


I am sending you back Q. Cicero's letter.[2] How hard-hearted of you not to be agitated by his dangers! He has something to say against me also. I am sending you half the letter. For the other half, with the account of his achievements, I think you have in duplicate. I have sent a letter-carrier to Cumæ to-day. I have given him your letter to Vestorius, which you had given Pharnaces. I had just sent Demeas to you when Eros arrived, but there was nothing new in the letter he brought except that the auction was to last two days. So you will come after it is over, as you say; and I hope with the Faberius affair settled. But Eros says that he won't settle to-day: he thinks he will to-morrow morning. You must be very polite to him. But such flatteries are almost criminal. I shall see you, I hope, the day after to-morrow. If you can do so from any source, find out who Mummius's ten legates were. Polybius doesn't give their names. I remember the consular Albinus and

  1. This may refer to some story of young Quintus. But we cannot be sure.
  2. The younger Quintus Cicero was with Cæsar in Spain. He appears to have written to his uncle Atticus, making the most of his adventures. His habit of romancing is again illustrated in Letter DCCL (Att. xv. 21). Some editors put this paragraph (down to "to-day") at the end of Letter DCIII: but it seems no more in place there, and leaves this letter beginning with ei dedi, without anyone for ei to refer to.