stripes one of the Senators of Novum Comum who had come to Rome, and added too this insult, “That he put these marks upon him to show that he was not a Roman,” and he told him to go and show them to Caesar.  After the consulship of Marcellus, when Caesar had now profusely poured forth his Gallic wealth for all those engaged in public life to draw from, and had released Curio[513] the tribune from many debts, and given to Paulus the consul fifteen hundred talents, out of which he decorated the Forum with the Basilica, a famous monument which he built in place of the old one called Fulvia;—­under these circumstances, Pompeius, fearing cabal, both openly himself and by means of his friends exerted himself to have a successor[514] appointed to Caesar in his government, and he sent and demanded back of him the soldiers[515] which he had lent to Caesar for the Gallic wars.  Caesar sent the men back after giving each of them a present of two hundred and fifty drachmae.  The officers who led these troops to Pompeius, spread abroad among the people reports about Caesar which were neither decent nor honest; and they misled Pompeius by ill-founded hopes, telling him that the army of Caesar longed to see him, and that while he with difficulty directed affairs at Rome owing to the odium produced by secret intrigues, the force with Caesar was all ready for him, and that if Caesar’s soldiers should only cross over to Italy, they would forthwith be on his side:  so hateful, they said, had Caesar become to them on account of his numerous campaigns, and so suspected owing to their fear of monarchy.  With all this Pompeius was inflated, and he neglected to get soldiers in readiness, as if he were under no apprehension; but by words and resolution he was overpowering Caesar, as he supposed, by carrying decrees against him, which Caesar cared not for at all.  It is even said that one of the centurions who had been sent by him to Rome, while standing in front of the Senate-house, on hearing that the Senate would not give Caesar a longer term in his government.  “But this,” he said, “shall give it,” striking the hilt of his sword with his hand.

XXX.  However, the claim of Caesar at least had a striking show of equity.  For he proposed that he should lay down his arms and that when Pompeius had done the same and both had become private persons, they should get what favours they could from the citizens; and he argued that if they took from him his power and confirmed to Pompeius what he had, they would be stigmatizing one as a tyrant and making the other a tyrant in fact.  When Curio made this proposal before the people on behalf of Caesar, he was loudly applauded; and some even threw chaplets of flowers upon him as on a victorious athlete.  Antonius, who was tribune, produced to the people a letter[516] of Caesar’s on this subject which he had received, and he read it in spite of the consuls.  But in the Senate, Scipio, the father-in-law of Pompeius, made a motion, that if Caesar did not lay down his