Cicero to Atticus, written at the Tusculan villa on 31 May 44 BC — Perseus dateline Scr. in Tusculano prid. K. Iun. a. 710 (44). Atticus has now left Cicero; since the departure two letters have arrived from Balbus (nothing new in them) and a matching pair from Hirtius, reporting that he is violently at odds with the veterans. Cicero is preoccupied with how to behave on the Kalends of June, the next sitting of the Senate; he has dispatched Tiro with several other couriers, so that Atticus may send a letter back by each as each piece of news comes in. He has also written to Antony about the embassy he is seeking — not just to Dolabella, lest the iracundus homo take offence — and has arranged to have his letter handed to Antony through Eutrapelus, since direct access is difficult. The legatio votiva, an embassy nominally to discharge a vow, is the more honourable form, but either type will serve.

Section 2 closes with anxiety about Atticus’s own safety and a piece of alarming intelligence: Graeceius has reported that Gaius Cassius has reported in turn that armed men are being mustered to be sent into the Tusculan country where Cicero is. The Latin around the assessment of this report and the precaution Cicero proposes is in textual ruin — two daggered cruxes in the manuscripts — and the sense must be left provisional. The letter ends in mid-thought, with the hope that the next day will bring something further to weigh.