Shoot, Luke, or Give Up the Gun.
Most men are presumed to have sense enough to know when the sun is up, and when it is down.
To no mortal on this earth is it a matter of vital importance to know the exact moment it rises and sets.
Even if any inquisitive lunatic wanted to know, he couldn’t find out, for the simple reason that the hour of sunrise and sunset varies with every mile of the earth’s surface, and is earlier to the man at the foot of the mountain than to the man on top.
In the military establishments of the world, however, it is considered to be a matter of life and death to know just when the sun rises and just when he sets. So extremely indispensable is this piece of daily information that a gun, a cannon we mean, must be fired to proclaim the tidings.
“Boom!”—the sun is up.
“Boom!”—he’s down.
Whereupon, your true soldier can sleep with a conscience childlike in its freedom from care.
Otherwise not.