Latin Texts & Translations

DCLXXV (F V, 10 b)

P. VATINIUS TO CICERO (AT ROME) NARONA, 5 DECEMBER.

AFTER the thanksgiving had been decreed in my honour I started for Dalmatia. I stormed and took six fortified towns. The largest of them, indeed, I have had practically to storm four times ^[Note] for I took four towers and four walls and their entire citadel, which snow, cold, and rain forced me to evacuate. It was mortifying to be obliged thus to abandon a town already taken and a war practically finished. Wherefore I beg you, if there is any occasion for it, to plead my cause with Caesar, and to regard it as your duty to defend my character in every respect, with the full Conviction that you have no more devoted friend than myself. Good-bye.

5 December, Narona.