If you get more certain tidings about Spain or any other matter, pray write and tell me while I am here, and perhaps at the time of going I may send you news, the more so because Tullia fancies that you are not leaving Italy at the present moment. I must explain to Antony as I did to Curio that I want to stay in Malta and refuse to take part in this civil war. I only hope that I may find him as easy and good to me as I found Curio. He will come it is said to Misenum on the second, that is to-day; but he has sent in advance a nasty letter of which I subjoin a copy:
VIIIa
"ANTONIUS TRIBUNE PROPRAETOR GREETING TO CICERO IMPERATOR.
"Had I not a great affection for you, and much more than you think, I should not have been alarmed at a report which has been spread about you, especially as I thought it to be false. But, just because I like you so very much, I cannot hide from myself that the report, although it may be false, causes me great concern. That you are about to go over seas I cannot believe, when you have such dear regard for Dolabella
lectissimam, tantique ab omnibus nobis fias; quibus mehercule dignitas amplitudoque tua paene carior est quam tibi ipsi. Sed tamen non sum arbitratus esse amici non commoveri etiam improborum sermone, atque eo feci studiosius, quod iudicabam duriores partes mihi impositas esse ob offensione nostra, quac magis a ζηλοτυπίᾳ mea quam ab iniuria tua nata est. Sic enim volo te tibi persuadere, mihi neminem esse cariorem te excepto Caesare meo meque illud una indicare, Caesarem maxime in suis M. Ciceronem reponere. Quare, mi Cicero, te rogo, ut tibi omina integra serves, eius fidem improbes, qui tibi, ut beneficium daret, prius iniuriam fecit, contra ne profugias, qui te, esti non amabit, quod accidere non potest, tamen salvum amplissimumque esse cupiet.
Dedita opera ad te Calpurnium, familiarissimum meum, misi, ut mihi magnae curae tuam vitam ac dignitatem esse scires."
Eodem die a Caesare Philotimus litteras attulit hoc exemplo: