There is no other historian of the period on which we are now engaged, of whose works even any fragments have descended to us. Atticus, however, wrote Memoirs of Rome from the earliest periods, and also memoirs of its principal families, as the Junian, Cornelian, and Fabian,—tracing their origin, enumerating their honours, and recording their exploits. At the same time Lucceius composed Histories of the Social War, and of the Civil Wars of Sylla, which were so highly esteemed by Cicero, that he urges him in one of his letters to undertake a history of his consulship, in which he discovered and suppressed the conspiracy of Catiline(221). From a subsequent letter to Atticus we learn that Lucceius had promised to accomplish the task suggested to him(222). It is probable, however, that it never was completed,—his labour having been interrupted by the civil wars, in which he followed the fortunes of Pompey, and was indeed one of his chief advisers in adopting the fatal resolution of quitting Italy. The Annals of Procilius, which appeared at this period, may be conjectured to have comprehended the whole series of Roman history, from the building of the city to his own time; since Varro quotes him for the account of Curtius throwing himself into the gulf(223) and Pliny refers to him for some remarks with regard to the elephants which appeared at Pompey’s African triumph(224). Brutus is also said to have written epitomes of the meagre and barren histories of Fannius and Antipater. That he should have thought of abridging narratives so proverbially dry and jejune, seems altogether inexplicable. The works of an historian called Cæcina have also perished, and if we may trust to his own account of them, their loss is not greatly to be deplored. In one of his letters to Cicero he says, “From much have I been compelled to refrain, many things I have been forced to pass over lightly, many to curtail, and very many absolutely to omit. Thus circumscribed, restricted, and broken as it is, what pleasure or what useful information can be expected from the recital(225)?”