DCXCIII (F V, 10)
FROM P. VATINIUS TO CICERO (AT ROME)
Narona (January)
If you are well I am glad; I am also well. I have not yet
fished out anything about your Dionysius;[1] and the less so,
because the Dalmatian cold, which forced me out of that
country, has again frozen me here. However, I will not
give up till I have sooner or later got hold of him. Yet after
all you are always setting me some hard task. You wrote
something or other to me about Catilius[2]—earnestly pleading
for his pardon. Don't talk about our friend Sextus
Servilius, for by heaven I am as fond of him as you are.
But are these the sort of clients, and these the sort of causes
which you undertake? Catilius—the cruellest fellow in the
world, who has murdered, abducted, ruined so many freeborn
men, matrons, citizens of Rome! Who has laid waste
so many countries! The fellow—half-ape and not worth
twopence—took up arms against me, and I have taken him
prisoner in war. But after all, my dear Cicero, what can I
do? I swear to you that I desire to do anything you ask.
My sentence upon him and this punishment which I was
going to inflict on him as my prisoner, I freely remit in deference
to your request. But what am I to say to those who
demand his punishment for the plunder of their property,
the capture of their ships, the murder of their brothers, sons,
and parents? Even if I had, by Jove, the impudence of
Appius, into whose place in the college I was elected, I
could not face that out. What is to be done then? I will
do my best to carry out anything that I know you wish.
He is being defended by Q. Volusius, a pupil of your own,
if that fact may chance to rout his enemies. That's his
best hope.
