the death of Catulus I am holding on this most excellent way alone, without escort and without companionship."
Pompey was kept aloof by the obstinacy and ingratitude of the Nobles, and this was in itself sufficient to spoil the hopes which Cicero had entertained for his "good cause." But in yet another quarter "the good cause" was perilously shaken. In these same months the "harmony of the orders," the union between Senate and Knights, which Cicero had taken such pains to realise, showed signs of dissolution. The scandal of the acquittal of Clodius had drawn attention to the corruption of the law-courts, and Cato and others pressed for vigorous measures against all jurors who had taken bribes. But as two-thirds of the jurors were now not of senatorial rank, such measures could not be carried through without infringing the cherished immunities of the Roman Knights.[1] At the same time the Knights had another quarrel with the Senate, because it refused to give them the consideration which they held to be their due in the arrangement of their contracts with the State. In both cases Cicero would have humoured the equestrian order, but he pleaded its cause in vain. We first hear of these jars in a letter of December, 61 B.C.[2]
"Here we are living in a political condition that is precarious, pitiful, and unstable. For, as I fancy you must have heard, our friends the Knights are all but alienated from the Senate. In the first place
