onorary commission as lieutenant, I went away, intending to be
present on the first of January, which appeared likely to be the first
day of assembling the senate.

III. I have now explained to you, O conscript fathers, my design
in leaving the city. Now I will briefly set before you, also, my
intention in returning, which may perhaps appear more unaccountable.
As I had avoided Brundusium, and the ordinary route into Greece, not
without good reason, on the first of August I arrived at Syracuse,
because the passage from that city into Greece was said to be a good
one. And that city, with which I had so intimate a connexion, could
not, though it was very eager to do so, detain me more than one night.
I was afraid that my sudden arrival among my friends might cause some
suspicion if I remained there at all. But after the winds had driven
me, on my departure from Sicily, to Leucopetra, which is a promontory
of the Rhegian district, I went up the gulf from that point, with the
view of crossing over. And I had not advanced far before I was driven
back by a foul wind to the very place which I had just quitted. And as
the night was stormy, and as I had lodged that night in the villa of
Publius Valerius, my companion and intimate friend, and as I remained
all the nest day at his house waiting for a fair wind, many of the
citizens of the municipality of Rhegium came to me. And of them there
were some who had lately arrived from Rome; from them I first heard
of the harangue of Marcus Antonius, with which I was so much pleased
that, after I had read it, I began for the first time to think of
returning. And not long afterwards the edict of Brutus and Cassius is
brought to me; which (perhaps because I love those men, even more for
the sake of the republic than of my own friendship for them) appeared
to me, indeed, to be full of equity. They added besides, (for it is a
very common thing for those who are desirous of bringing good news to
invent something to make the news which they bring seem more joyful,)
that parties were coming to an agreement; that the senate was to
meet on the first of August; that Antonius having discarded all evil
counsellors, and having given up the provinces of Gaul, was about to
return to submission to the authority of the senate.

IV. But on this I was inflamed with such eagerness to return, that no
oars or winds could be fast enough for me; not that I thought that I
should not arrive in time, but lest I s