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Epistulae ad Familiares, III. x.-xi.

remarks about me. Since his son then is your son-in-law, and since, over and above this connexion by marriage, I know how dear and how delightful a companion you are to Cn. Pompeius, I ask you, what is my feeling towards you bound to be? Especially when he has written me such a letter that, had I been your enemy and not your devoted friend, I should have been propitiated by it, and submitted myself unreservedly to the wishes, yes, even to the nod, of one who had deserved so well of me.

11 But no more on these topics; perhaps I have already dealt with them at unnecessary length. Now let me tell you what schemes I have started and put on a sound footing[1] . . . And all this that I am doing, and intend to do, is in defence of your high position rather than to secure your personal safety. For I hope to hear at an early date that you have been elected censor; well, the duties of that magistracy demand very high courage and very sound judgement, and I am of opinion that you would do well to give more earnest and careful consideration to those duties than you do to my activities in your interest.

XI

M. Cicero to Appius Pulcher, censor (I hope)

In camp on the Pyramus,[2] June, 50 B.C.

1 While in camp on the river Pyramus, I have had two letters from you delivered to me at the same time, which Q. Servilius had sent me from Tarsus. In one of them the date given was April 5; the other, which I gathered to be the later of the two, was undated.

  1. ↑ What follows here is supposed to have been expunged before these letters were published.
  2. ↑ One of the largest rivers of Asia Minor, rising in the south-east of Cappadocia, flowing through Cilicia, and reaching the sea near Mallus.
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