Chapter 11

These dangers. I can guard against in the city; it is easy for me to look around and see where I am going out from, whither I am going, what there is on my right hand, and on my left. Shall I be able to do the same on the roads of the Apennines? in which, even if there should be no ambush, as there easily may be, still my mind will be kept in such a state of anxiety as not to be able to attend to the duties of an embassy. But suppose I have escaped all plots against me, and have passed over the Apennines; still I have to encounter a meeting and conference with Antonius. What place am I to select? If it is outside the camp, the rest may look to themselves,—I think that death would come upon me instantly. I know the frenzy of the man; I know his unbridled violence. The ferocity of his manners and the savageness of his nature is not usually softened even by wine. Then, inflamed by anger and insanity, with his brother Lucius, that foulest of beasts, at his side, he will never keep his sacrilegious and impious hands from me. I can recollect conferences with most bitter enemies, and with citizens in a state of the most bitter disagreement.

Cnaeus Pompeius, the son of Sextus, being consul, in my presence, when I was serving my first campaign in his army, had a conference with Publius Vettius Scato, the general of the Marsians, between the camps. And I recollect that Sextus Pompeius, the brother of the consul, a very learned and wise man, came thither from Rome to the conference. And when Scato had saluted him, “What,” said he, “am I to call you?”—“Call me,” said he, “one who is by inclination a friend, by necessity an enemy.” That conference was conducted with fairness: there was no fear, no suspicion, even their mutual hatred was not great, for the allies were not seeking to take our city from us, but to be themselves admitted to share the privileges of it. Sulla and Scipio, one attended by the flower of the nobility, the other by the allies, had a conference between Cales and Teanum, respecting the authority of the senate, the suffrages of the people, and the privileges of citizenship; and agreed upon conditions and stipulations. Good faith was not strictly observed at that conference; but still there was no violence used, and no danger incurred.