The Roman History · Amm. 17.11.4

Moreover, wicked detractors, scrutinizing the character of Pompey, when no pretext for finding fault with him could be discovered, remarked two qualities in which they could raise a laugh against him; one that he had a sort of natural trick of scratching his head with one finger: another that for the purpose of concealing an unsightly sore, he used to bind one of his legs with a white bandage. Of which habits, the first they said showed a dissolute man; the second, one eager for a change of government; contending, with a somewhat meagre argument, that it did not signify what part of his body he clothed with a badge of royal dignity; so snarling at that man of whom the most glorious proofs show that no braver and truer patriot ever lived.

Ammianus Marcellinus · translated by C. D. Yonge · 1911 reprint
C. D. Yonge translation (preface dated February 1862); G. Bell and Sons, 1911; Project Gutenberg #28587
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