ve Rome. I have sent a man to clear the freightage. I am
exceedingly obliged to you for having taken so much trouble to get them,
and so reasonably. As to your frequent remarks in your letters about
pacifying my friend, I have done everything I could and tried every
expedient; but he is inveterate against you to a surprising degree, on
what suspicions, though I think you have been told, you shall yet learn
from me when you come. I failed to restore Sallustius[38] to his old
place in his affections, and yet he was on the spot. I tell you this
because the latter used to find fault with me in regard to you. Well, he
has found by personal experience that _he_ is not so easy to pacify, and
that on my part no zeal has been lacking either on his or your behalf. I
have betrothed Tulliola to C. Piso Frugi, son of Lucius.[39]

[Footnote 37: The point of this frigid joke is not clear. Was the
grandmother really dead? What was she to do with the Latin _feriae_? Mr.
Strachan Davidson's explanation is perhaps the best, that Cicero means
that the old lady was thinking of the Social War in B.C. 89, when the
loyalty of the Latin towns must have been a subject of anxiety. She is
in her dotage and only remembers old scares. This is understanding
_civitates_ with _Latinae_. Others understand _feriae_ or _mulieres_.
Saufeius, a Roman eques, was an Epicurean, who would hold death to be no
evil. He was a close friend of Atticus, who afterwards saved his
property from confiscation by the Triumvirs (Nep. _Att._ 12).]

[Footnote 38: Cneius Sallustius, a learned friend of Cicero's, of whom
we shall often hear again.]

[Footnote 39: C. Calpurnius Piso, quaestor B.C. 58, died in B.C. 57. The
marriage took place in B.C. 63.]

IX (A I, 4)

TO ATTICUS (AT ATHENS)

ROME

[Sidenote: B.C. 65, AET. 41]

You keep on making me expect you again and again. Only the other day,
when I thought you on the point of arriving, I was suddenly put off by
you till Quintilis (July). Now, however, I _do_ think that you should
come at the time you mention if you possibly can. You will thereby be in
time for my brother Quintus's election, will pay me a long-deferred
visit, and will settle the dispute with Acutilius. This latter Peducaeus
also suggested my mentioning to you, for I think it is full time that
you settled that affair. My good offices are at your service and always
have been so. Here at Rome I have conducted the case of Gaius Macer with
a popu