Two peasant brothers, Ulysses and Michelangelo, live with their sister Venus and Cleopatra, Ulysses' wife. Carabinieri arrive, bearing an invitation from the King to the war in which the country is engaged. The two brothers are reluctant to join the war, but faced with the carabinieri's promise of riches, they leave. They return as poor as before, wounded and full of the horrors of war, and finally shot for their crimes, their king having been defeated.