place to place, seeking the protection of officials against
assassination, writing letters urging his supporters to agitate for his
recall, sometimes accusing them of lukewarmness and even
treachery, bemoaning the ingratitude of his' country or regretting
the course of action that had led to his outlawry, and suffering
from extreme depression over his separation from his wife and
children and the wreck of his political ambitions. Finally in
August, 57 B. C., the decree for his restoration was passed, and he
returned to Rome the next month, being received with immense
popular enthusiasm. During the next few years the renewal of the
understanding among the triumvirs shut Cicero out from any
leading part in politics, and he resumed his activity in the
law-courts, his most important case being, perhaps, the defence of
Milo for the murder. of Clodius, Cicero's most troublesome
enemy. This oration, in the revised form in which it has come
down to us, is ranked as among the finest specimens of the art of
the orator, though in its original form it failed to secure Milo's
acquittal. Meantime, Cicero was also devoting much time to
literary composition, and his letters show great dejection over the
political situation, and a somewhat wavering attitude towards the
various parties in the state. In 55 B. C. he went to Cilicia in Asia
Minor as proconsul, an office which he administered with
efficiency and integrity in civil affairs and with success in military.
He returned to Italy in the end of the following year, and he was
publicly thanked by the senate for his services, but disappointed in
his hopes for a triumph. The war for supremacy between Caesar
and Pompey which had for some time been gradually growing
more certain, broke out in 49 B.C., when Caesar led his army
across the Rubicon, and Cicero after much irresolution threw in his
lot with Pompey, who was overthrown the next year in the battle