Latin Texts & Translations

DCCCXLIX (F X, 14)

TO L. MUNATIUS PLANCUS (IN GALLIA COMATA) ROME, 5 MAY

WHAT a pleasant report it was that we received two days before that of the victory of the support you were bringing up, of your zeal, your rapid movements, and the forces at your disposal! And yet even now that the enemy have been

repulsed our whole hope is in you. For the most notorious ringleaders of those outlaws are said to have escaped from the battle of Mutina. Now it is no less satisfactory to wipe out the last part of an invasion than to drive off the first. As for me, I am anxiously looking for a letter from you, and my anxiety is shared by many. I am in hopes, too, that Lepidus—warned by the present state of public affairs-wilt act with you and the Republic. Therefore, my dear Plancus, make it your special aim that not a single spark of that most abominable war be left alight. If this is accomplished, you will have done the state a service more than human and will also win imperishable honour for yourself.

5 May.