+Context.+ After his passage of the Rubicon, Caesar quickly made himself master of Italy. Town after town opened its gates to him. Corfinium (held in force by Domitius for Pompeius) surrendered, and the captured troops enlisted in his ranks. An attempt to blockade Pompeius in Brundisium was skilfully foiled. On the last day of March Caesar arrived at Rome. The Senate was legally summoned by the tribunes Antonius and Cassius, and +was invited to unite with him in carrying on the government+.
[Linenotes: 2. +municipia+, i.e. Brundisium, Tarentum, Hydruntum (Otranto). 10. +ut sui ... haberetur+, i.e. allowing him to stand for the consulship in his absence. 15. +iacturam dignitatis+ = sacrifice of prestige. --Long. 19. +eripiendis legionibus+, i.e. in 50 B.C. Caesar was required to send home a legion he had borrowed of Pompeius, and contribute another himself, ostensibly for the Parthian War; but the legions were detained by Pompeius in Italy, and the Parthian War was quietly dropped.]
+Caesar in Rome.+ All Caesar’s acts after the crossing of the Rubicon were entirely unconstitutional. But when he told the senators that he was prepared to take the government on himself, he was justified to himself by the past, and to posterity by the result. --W. F.
_The Campaign round Lerida: the Soldiers fraternise, 49 B.C._
Dixit et ad montes tendentem praevenit hostem. Illic exiguo paulum distantia vallo Castra locant. Postquam spatio languentia nullo Mutua conspicuos habuerunt lumina voltus, 170 Et fratres natosque sues videre, patresque; Deprensum est civile nefas. Tenuere parumper Ora metu, tantum nutu motoque salutant Ense suos; mox ut stimulis maioribus ardens Rupit amor leges, audet transcendere vallum 175 Miles, in amplexus effusas tendere palmas. Hospitis ille ciet nomen, vocat ille propinquum, Admonet hunc studiis consors puerilibus aetas; Nec Romanus erat, qui non agnoverat hostem. 179 Pax erat, et miles castris permixtus utrisque 196 Errabat; duro concordes caespite mensas Instituunt et permixto libamina Baccho; Graminei luxere foci, iunctoque cubili Extrahit insomnes bellorum fabula noctes, 200 Quo primum steterint campo, qua lancea dextrum Exierit. Dum quae gesserunt fortia iactant, Et dum multa negant, quod solum fata petebant, Est miseris renovata fides, atque omne futurum Crevit amore nefas. 205