Cicero to Atticus, written at the Tusculan villa around the twenty-second of August 45 BC — Perseus dateline Scr. in Tusculano circ. xi K. Sept. a. 709 (45). Five short sections in the practical, busy register the letters take on when Caesar is in motion and Cicero is arranging logistics. The opening section is the most consequential: Cicero has composed a letter to Caesar on Caesar’s pamphlets against Cato (the Anticatones), to be delivered through Dolabella; he has sent a copy first to Caesar’s intimates Balbus and Oppius for clearance, and they have approved it with what is plainly a courtier’s flattery (“they had never read anything better”). Cicero is managing the channel as carefully as the text.

The remaining sections handle a piece of property conveyance for Vestorius at Puteoli, gossip about how much Tigellius has pocketed from Caesar (Cicero is curious and pretends to be above it), and the practical question of where to lodge on the way out to meet Caesar at Alsium. Murena’s house falls into place when Silius proves to have no cushions and Dida has handed his villa over to guests. The closing line — “the previous little line just written” — captures the texture of these summer letters, news arriving in the middle of dictation.