here you are in my interests. Nay,
you will find me feeling towards you, and hear of it from others,
exactly as though my success were obtained not only in your presence,
but by your direct agency.

Tulliola gives notice of action against you. She is dunning me as your
surety.

VII (A I, 11)

TO ATTICUS (AT ATHENS)

ROME

[Sidenote: B.C. 67, AET. 39]

I was doing so before spontaneously, and have been since greatly stirred
by your two letters, with their earnest expressions to the same effect.
Besides, Sallustius has been always at my side to prompt me to spare no
pains to induce Lucceius to be reconciled to you. But after doing
everything that could be done, not only did I fail to renew his old
feelings towards you, but I could not even succeed in eliciting the
reason of his alienation. On his part, however, he keeps harping on that
arbitration case of his, and the other matters which I knew very well
before you left Rome were causing him offence. Still, he has certainly
got something else fixed deeper in his mind; and this no letters _from_
you, and no commissioning of me will obliterate as easily as you will do
in a personal interview, I don't mean merely by your words, but by the
old familiar expression of your face--if only you think it worth while,
as you will if you will listen to me, and be willing to act with your
habitual kindness. Finally, you need not wonder why it is that, whereas
I intimated in my letters that I felt hopeful of his yielding to my
influence, I now appear to have no such confidence; for you can scarcely
believe how much more stubborn his sentiment appears to me than I
expected, and how much more obstinate he is in this anger. However, all
this will either be cured when you come, or will only be painful to the
party in fault.

As to the sentence in your letter, "you suppose by this time I am
praetor-elect," let me tell you that there is no class of people at Rome
so harassed by every kind of unreasonable difficulty as candidates for
office; and that no one knows when the elections will be.[35] However,
you will hear all this from Philadelphus. Pray despatch at the earliest
opportunity what you have bought for my "Academia." I am surprisingly
delighted with the mere thought of that place, to say nothing of its
actual occupation. Mind also not to let anyone else have your books.
Reserve them, as you say in your letter, for me. I am possessed with the
utmost longing for them, a