t but fear that when so much
mud has been thrown some will stick, and therefore almost hesitates to
tell of the mud, believing that no stain of this kind has been in truth
deserved.

It seems that Antony, Cicero's colleague in the Consulship, who became
Proconsul in Macedonia, had undertaken to pay some money to Cicero. Why
the money was to be paid we do not know, but there are allusions in
Cicero's letters to Atticus to one Teucris (a Trojan woman), and it
seems that Antony was designated by the nickname. Teucris is very slow
at paying his money, and Cicero is in want of it. But perhaps it will be
as well not to push the matter. He, Antony, is to be tried for
provincial peculation, and Cicero declares that the case is so bad that
he cannot defend his late colleague. Hence have arisen two different
suspicions: one that Antony had agreed to make over to Cicero a share of
the Macedonian plunder in requital of Cicero's courtesy in giving up the
province which had been allotted to himself; the second, that Antony was
to pay Cicero for defending him. As to the former, Cicero himself
alludes to such a report as being common in Macedonia, and as having
been used by Antony himself as an excuse for increased rapine. But this
has been felt to be incredible, and has been allowed to fall to the
ground because of the second accusation. But in support of that there is
no word of evidence,[219] whereas the tenor of the story as told by
Cicero himself is against it. Is it likely, would it be possible, that
Cicero should have begun his letter to Atticus by complaining that he
could not get from Antony money wanted for a peculiar purpose--it was
wanted for his new house--and have gone on in the same letter to say
that this might be as well, after all, as he did not intend to perform
the service for which the money was to be paid? The reader will remember
that the accusation is based solely on Cicero's own statement that
Antony was negligent in paying to him money that had been promised. In
all these accusations the evidence against Cicero, such as it is, is
brought exclusively from Cicero's own words. Cicero did afterward defend
this Antony, as we learn from his speech Pro Domo Sua; but his change of
purpose in that respect has nothing to do with the argument.

[Sidenote: B.C. 62, aetat. 45.]

We have two speeches extant made this year: one on behalf of P. Sulla,
nephew to the Dictator; the other for Archias the Greek scholar and
poet