Cicero

Not long after this, when Catiline’s soldiers in Etruria were already assembling and forming into companies, and when the day set for their attack was near, there came to the house of Cicero at midnight men who were the leading and most powerful Romans, Marcus Crassus, Marcus Marcellus, and Scipio Metellus; and knocking at the door and summoning the doorkeeper, they bade him wake Cicero and tell him they were there.

Their business was what I shall now relate. After Crassus had dined, his doorkeeper handed him some letters which an unknown man had brought; they were addressed to different persons, and one, which had no signature, was for Crassus himself. Crassus read this letter only, and since its contents told him that there was to be much bloodshed caused by Catiline, and advised him to escape secretly from the city, he did not open the rest, but came at once to Cicero, terrified by the danger, and seeking to free himself somewhat from charges that had been made against him on account of his friendship for Catiline.[*](See the Crassus, xiii 3. Cicero’s treatise on his consulship, there referred to, was written in Greek, and is not extant. )

Cicero, accordingly, after deliberation, convened the senate at break of day, and carrying the letters thither gave them to the persons to whom they had been sent, with orders to read them aloud. All the letters alike were found to tell of a plot. And when also Quintus Arrius, a man of praetorian dignity, brought word of the soldiers who were being mustered into companies in Etruria, and Manlius was reported to be hovering about the cities there with a large force, in constant expectation of some news from Rome,

the senate passed a decree that matters should be put in the hands of the consuls, who were to accept the charge and manage as best they knew how for the preservation of the city.[*](Dent operam consules ne quid respublica detrimenti capiat (Sallust, Catiline, 29); decrevit quondam senatus ut L. Opimius consul videret ne quid res publica detrimenti caperet (Cicero, in Catil. i. 2, 4).) Now, the senate is not wont to do this often, but only when it fears some great danger.

On receiving this power Cicero entrusted matters outside to Quintus Metellus, while he himself kept the city in hand and daily went forth attended by so large a bodyguard that a great part of the forum was occupied when he entered it with his escort. Thereupon Catiline, no longer able to endure the delay, resolved to hasten forth to Manlius and his army,

and ordered Marcius and Cethegus[*](From Cicero’s oration pro Sulla (6, 18) and Sallust’s Catiline (28) it appears that the names of these would-be murders were Caius Cornelius and Lucius Vargunteius.) to take their swords and go early in the morning to the house of Cicero on pretence of paying him their respects, and there to fall upon him and dispatch him. This scheme Fulvia, a woman of high rank, made known to Cicero, coming to him by night and urging him to be on his guard against Cethegus and his companion. The men came at break of day, and when they were prevented from entering, they were incensed and made an outcry at the door, which made them the more suspected.