[22]
Caecina being repulsed from that spot, still
went as he could towards that farm, from which, according to their agreement, he was to be
formally ejected by force. A row of olive-trees in a straight line marks the extreme boundary
of that farm. When they came near them, Aebutius was there with all his forces, and he
summoned his slave, by name Antiochus, to him, and with a loud voice ordered him to kill any
one who entered within that line of olives. Caecina, a most prudent man in my opinion, appears
nevertheless to have shown in this affair more courage than wisdom. For though he saw that
multitude of armed men, and though he had heard that expression of Aebutius which I have
mentioned, still he came nearer, and was entering, within the boundaries of that section which
the olive-trees marked out, when he was put to flight by the assault of Antiochus in arms, and
by the darts and onset of the rest. At the same time his friends and assistants all take to
flight with him; being greatly alarmed, as you heard one of them state in his evidence.
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M. Tullius Cicero. The Orations of Marcus Tullius Cicero, literally translated by C. D. Yonge, B. A. London. Henry G. Bohn, York Street, Covent Garden. 1856.
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