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292 with anecdote and conversation, and in charm and interest the work is only inferior to a dialogue of Plato.

The distraction of literary composition gave Cicero some relief from his drudgery in the law-courts, and some consolation in his disgust at the political situation. During a holiday at Puteoli, where probably the greater part of the De Oratore was planned, we find him writing to Atticus: "Here I am feasting in Faustus Sulla's library. Don't suppose I mean on the oysters of the Lucrine—not that they are wanting. But the truth is that in proportion as my taste for all other pleasures is spoiled by grief for the commonwealth, I find myself more and more dependent on literature for support and comfort."

Cicero's next effort was in the direction of political philosophy. In May 54 B.C., he begs Atticus to give him the run of his library during his absence. He wishes particularly to consult some writings of Varro, "for the purpose of the work which I have in hand and which I think will give you pleasure." This work was that which afterwards developed into the two treatises on The Commonwealth, and on The Laws. We gather that Cicero had at first written nine books of the dialogues of Scipio and his friends. Afterwards he cut off the last three books and made them the nucleus of the separate treatise entitled The Laws, in which he drops his historical personages and makes Atticus, Quintus, and