What is your own inference as to the character of the parasite in war? In the first place, does he not get his breakfast before he leaves his quarters to fall in, just as Odysseus thinks it right to do? Under no other circumstances, he says, is it possible to continue fighting in battle even if one should be obliged to begin fighting at the very break of day.

Iliad 19, 160-163.

While the other soldiers in affright are adjusting their helmets with great pains, or putting on their breastplates, or quaking in sheer anticipation of the horrors of war, the parasite eats with a very cheerful visage; and directly after marching out he begins to fight in the first line. The man who supports him is posted in the second line, behind the parasite, who covers him with his shield as Ajax covered Teucer, and when missiles are flying exposes himself to protect his patron; for he prefers to save his patron rather than himself.