Robert Ervin Howard,
The Skull in the Clouds
(1929)
“ The Black Prince scowled above his lance, and wrath in his hot eyes lay, "I would rather you rode with the spears of France and not at my side today. "A man may parry an open blow, but I know not where to fend; "I would that you were an open foe, instead of a sworn friend. "You came to me in an hour of need, and your heart I thought I saw; "But you are one of a rebel breed that knows not king or law. "You -- with your ever smiling face and a black heart under your mail— "With the haughty strain of the Norman race and the wild, black blood of the Gael. ”
