be taken
as a pupil. Cicero himself was thus apprenticed to Mucius Scaevola the
augur: and in the same way the young Caelius, as soon as he had taken
his toga virilis, was brought by his father to Cicero. The relation
between the youth and his preceptor was not unlike that of the
_contubernium_ in military life, in which the general to whom a lad
was committed was supposed to be responsible for his welfare and
conduct as well as for his education in the art of war: thus Cicero
says of Caelius[294] that at that period of his life no one ever saw
him "except with his father or with me, or in the very well-conducted
house of M. Crassus" (who shared with Cicero in the guardianship).
"Fuit assiduus mecum," he says a little farther on. This kind of
pupilage was called the _tirocinium fori_, in which a lad should be
pursuing his studies for the legal profession, and also his bodily
exercises in the Campus Martius, so that he might be ready to serve
in the army for the single campaign which was still desirable if not
absolutely necessary. When he had made his first speech in a court of
law, he was said _tirocinium ponere_,[295] and if it were a success,
he might devote himself more particularly henceforward to the art and
practice of oratory. No doubt all really ambitious young men, who
aimed at high office and an eventual provincial government, would,
like Caesar, endeavour to qualify themselves for the army as well as
the Forum. Cicero, however, whose instincts were not military, served
only in one campaign, at the age of seventeen, and apparently he
advised Caelius to do no more than this. Caelius served under
Q. Pompeius proconsul of Africa, to whom he was attached as
_contubernalis_, choosing this province because his father had estates
there.[296] It was only on his return with a good character from
Pompeius that he proceeded to exhibit his skill as an orator by
accusing some distinguished person--in this case the Antonius who was
afterwards consul with Cicero.[297]

To attain the skill in oratory which would enable the pupil to make
a successful appearance in the Forum, he must have gone through an
elaborate training in the art of rhetoric. Cicero does not tell us
whether he himself gave Caelius lessons in rhetoric, or whether he
sent him to a professional teacher; he had himself written a treatise
on a part of the subject--the _de Inventione_ of 80 B.C., the earliest
of all his prose works--and was therefore quite able