We have seen that the young Marcus had a large allowance at Athens and on the whole he seems to have kept fairly well within it, in spite of some trouble; but his cousin the younger Quintus, coming to see his uncle in December 45, showed him a gloomy countenance, and on being asked the meaning of it, said that he was going with Caesar to the Parthian war in order to avoid his creditors, and presumably to make money to pay them with.[145] He had not even enough money for the journey out.

His uncle did not offer to give him any, but he does not seem to have thought very seriously of the young man's embarrassments.
One more example of the financial dealings of the business men of this extraordinary age, and we will bring this chapter to an end.

It is a story which has luckily been preserved in Cicero's speech in defence of a certain Rabirius Postumus in the year 54, who was accused under Caesar's law de pecuniis repetundis (extortion in the provinces).

It is a remarkable revelation of all the most striking methods of making and using money in the last years of the Republic.
The father of this Rabirius, says Cicero, had been a distinguished member of the equestrian order, and "fortissimus et maximus publicanus"; not greedy of money, but most liberal to his friends--in other words, he was not a miser, for that character was rare in this age, but lent his money freely in order to acquire influence and consideration.

The son took up the same line of business, and engaged in a wide sphere of financial operations.