therefore anything you choose, so long as you write something. For at the moment I cannot think of anything you are likely to write about, unless by any chance you have seen your way at all in regard to Mustela, or have had an interview with Silius.
Brutus arrived at his Tusculan villa yesterday between four and five in the afternoon. To-day therefore he will see me, and I could have wished that you were here. I have myself given orders that he should be told that you had waited for his arrival as long as you could and would come if you were told of it, and that I would inform you at once, as I hereby do.[1]
DCXIX (F VI, 11)
TO TREBIANUS (IN EXILE)
(Rome, June)
Hitherto I have felt nothing more than a natural affection
for Dolabella: I was under no obligation to him—for it
never chanced to be necessary—and he was in my debt for
my having stood by him in his hours of danger.[2] Now,
however, I have become bound to him by so strong an
obligation—for having previously in regard to your property,
and on the present occasion in the matter of your recall,
gratified me to the fullest possible degree—that I can owe
no one more than I do him. In regard to this matter,
while I warmly congratulate you, I wish you to congratulate
rather than thank me. The latter I do not in the least
desire, the former you will be able to do with truth. For
the rest, since your high character and worth have secured
- ↑ Tyrrell and Purser and Mueller arrange this paragraph as a separate letter, a day later than the previous part. But there does not seem sufficient reason for departing from the ordinary arrangement. Cicero often began a letter early in the day, and added a postscript later, when anything turned up.
- ↑ Cicero had twice defended Dolabella (vol. ii., pp. 160-161).
