The omens which preceded the battle are recorded by Dion Cassius, xlvii. 49.
[563] M. Valerius Messala Corvinus, of a distinguished Roman family, was a son of Messala who was consul B.C. 53. After the battle of Philippi he attached himself to M. Antonius, whom he deserted to join Octavianus Cæsar. He fought on Cæsar’s side at the battle of Actium (c. 53). He died somewhere between B.C. 3 and A.D. 3. Messala was a poet and an historian. His history of the Civil Wars, after the death of the Dictator Cæsar, was used by Plutarch.
[564] See the note of Sintenis, who proposes to read κεκλημένος for κεκλημένον, to prevent any ambiguity, such as Kaltwasser discovered in the passage. It was the birthday of Cassius (Appian, Civil Wars, iv, 113).
[565] Plutarch here quotes the Memoirs of Cæsar. It is of no great importance who saw the dream, and perhaps there was no dream at all. Cæsar wished to have an excuse for being out of the way of danger. Dion Cassius (xlvii. 41) says that it was Cæsar’s physician who had the dream, but he does not mention his name. See the notes of Reimarus.
[566] The true name may be Briges. The Briges were a Thracian tribe (Stephan. Byzant., Βρίγες), who are mentioned by Herodotus (vii. 73). The Macedonian tradition was that they were the same as the Phrygians; that so long as they lived in Europe with the Macedonians they kept the name of Briges, and that when they passed over into Asia they were called Phryges.
[567] Drumann (Geschichte Roms, i. 516, n. 84) assumes that it is P. Volumnius Eutrapelus, a boon companion of Antonius. Several of Cicero’s letters to him are extant (Ad Div. vii. 32, 33).
[568] Plutarch has handled the character of Brutus with partiality. He could not be ignorant of his love of money and of the oppressive manner in which he treated his unlucky creditors. Drumann (Junii, p. 20, &c.) has collected the evidence on this point. Though Brutus was an austere man and affected philosophy, his character is not free from the imputation of ingratitude to Cæsar, love of power, and avarice. He seems to have been one of those who deceive themselves into a belief of their own virtues, because they are free from other people’s vices. The promise of plunder to his soldiers is not excusable because Antonius and Cæsar did worse than he intended to do. Plutarch here alludes to many of the Italians being driven out of their lands, which were given to the soldiers who had fought on the side of Cæsar and Antonius at Philippi. The misery that was occasioned by this measure was one of the chief evils of the Civil Wars. The slaughter in war chiefly affected the soldiers themselves, and if both armies had been destroyed, the people would only have been the better for it. The misery that arose from the ejection of the hard-working husbandmen reached to their wives and children. But a country which had a large army on foot which is no longer wanted, must either pay them out of taxes and plunder, or have a revolution. Necessity was the excuse for Cæsar and Antonius, and the same necessity would have been the excuse of Brutus, if he had been victorious. Defeat saved him from this necessity.
[569] The ships which were bringing aid to Cæsar from Brundusium under the command of Domitius Calvinus. They were met and defeated by L. Statius Marcus.
[570] Nothing seems to be known about him. Of course he is not the Volumnius mentioned in c. 45.
[571] See the Life of Cato the Younger, c. 73.