"The cook's mother is a Pict," she replied.
"Well, she'd better not come here!" said the headman. "We want no Celts!"
"But, Grandfather, we are Celts!"
"No, girl, we are Romans," he answered, looking sideways at the captain.
The captain nodded. "That is true. All members of the Empire are Romans. Not citizens, perhaps, but Romans just the same, and all live by Caesar's law."
"But suppose people don't want to live by his law?" said the girl.
The two lieutenants looked shocked, but the captain smiled. "That would be most foolish and uncivilized of them. Don't you think it's better for the whole world to live as members of one community and cease all this useless warfare?"
"It seems to me," the girl said, "that warfare is the result of somebody trying to take somebody else's land and subject him to a law that is alien to him."
The captain raised his eyebrows and put his head to one side quizzically. The headman coughed and attempted to change the subject. "The taxes, Captain," he said, "are very much on my mind...."