cold having lighted many fires, the
tents were burnt in the night, and the book was destroyed. The king's
managers who were present were ready to stop the mouths of the enemies
and detractors of Cato; but the matter gave him annoyance for other
reasons. For it was not to prove his own integrity, but to set an
example of exact dealing to others that he was ambitious to produce
his accounts, and this was the cause of his vexation.

XXXIX. Cato's arrival with the ships did not pass unobserved by the
Romans, for all the magistrates and priests, and all the Senate and a
great part of the people met him at the river, so that both the banks
were covered, and Cato's voyage upwards was not inferior to a triumph
in show and splendour. Yet it seemed to some to be a perverse and
stubborn thing, that though the consuls and praetors were present, Cato
neither landed to meet them nor stopped his course, but sweeping along
the shore in a royal galley of six banks, he never stopped till he had
moored his ships in the dockyard. However, when the money was carried
along through the Forum, the people were amazed[717] at the quantity,
and the Senate assembling voted together with suitable thanks that an
extraordinary praetorship[718] should be given to Cato, and that he
should wear a dress with a purple border when he was present at the
public spectacles. Cato protested against both these distinctions, but
he recommended the Senate to emancipate Nikias, the king's steward, to
whose care and integrity he bore testimony. At that time Philippus,
the father of Marcia, was consul, and in a manner the dignity and
power of the office were transferred to Cato, for the colleague of
Philippus[719] paid no less respect to Cato on account of his merit
than on account of his relationship to Philippus.

XL. When Cicero[720] had returned from the exile into which he was
driven by Clodius, and was now a powerful man, he forcibly pulled down
and destroyed in the absence of Clodius, the tribunitian tablets which
Clodius had recorded and placed in the Capitol; and the Senate having
been assembled about this business, and Clodius making it a matter of
accusation, Cicero said that inasmuch as Clodius had been made tribune
in an illegal manner, all that had been done during his tribunate and
recorded ought to be ineffectual and invalid. But Cato took exception
to what Cicero said, and at length he rose and declared, that he was
of opinion that there was nothin