The political witch-dance was at its height and Cicero was
in his glory. "The elections," he wrote to Atticus, "will not, I think, be
held; and Clodius will be prosecuted by Milo unless he is first killed.
Milo will kill him if he falls in with him. He is not afraid to do it, and
he says openly that he will do it. He is not frightened at the misfortune
which fell on me. He is not the man to listen to traitorous friends or to
trust indolent patricians." [11]
With recovered spirits the Senate began again to attack the laws of Caesar
and Clodius as irregular; but they were met with the difficulty which
Clodius had provided. Cato had come back from Cyprus, delighted with his
exploit and with himself, and bringing a ship-load of money with him for
the public treasury. If the laws were invalidated by the disregard of
Bibulus and the signs of the sky, then the Cyprus mission had been invalid
also, and Cato's fine performance void. Caesar's grand victories, the news
of which was now coming in, made it inopportune to press the matter
farther; and just then another subject rose, on which the optimates ran
off like hounds upon a fresh scent.
Ptolemy of Cyprus had been disposed of. Ptolemy Auletes had been preserved
on the throne of Egypt by subsidies to the chiefs of the Senate. But his
subjects had been hardly taxed to raise the money.
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