"All Britanni stain themselves with vitrum (woad?) which produces a dark blue color, and by this means they have a horrible aspect in battle." Julius Caesar, Gallic Wars, Book V.

There was a time when the inhabitants of what is now England were rather fierce chaps. But the Romans did eventually subdue much of the island, and over the centuries these Celts became as used to the finer things in life as their Roman masters – you know, the baths, the grapes being dropped into their mouths, etc. You get the picture. When the Romans left, these urbane Britons had to hire Anglo-Saxons to fight their battles for them; and we know how that turned out.

Rome of course, left because they too were having some of the same issues. They hired Goth boys to do what Roman boys could not, or would not, do – face off against the Huns. In the end, though, it was not Attila that sacked Rome. It was Alaric… the Goth.

We should keep such things in mind as we go about training our little boys to behave like little girls, and not do what little boys naturally do. For the day may come soon – and it will come – when we will have to ask those boys to secure a beachhead under fire. And on that day, we will be praying that our "training" didn’t take.

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