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In the throes of one of the terrible revolutions of the worst days of imperial Rome—when probably the cruelest mob and most licentious soldiery of all time were raging round the palace of the Cæsars, and the chances of an hour would decide whether Galba or Otho should rule the world, the alternative being a violent death—an officer of the guard, one Julius Atticus, rushed into Galba’s presence with a bloody sword, boasting that he had slain his rival, Otho. “My comrade, by whose order?” was his only greeting from the old Pagan chief. And the story has come down through eighteen centuries, in the terse, strong sentences of the great historian, Tacitus.

Comrade, who ordered thee? whose will art thou doing? It is the question which has to be asked of every fighting man, in whatever part of the great battlefield he comes to the front, and determines the manliness of soldier, statesman, parson, of every strong man, and suffering woman.