images of murdered sons and outraged daughters passed before her mind's
eye, and, like Banquo's ghost, filled the vacant seats at the table; while
the men gazed anxiously out, expecting to see their granaries and
store-houses in flames. Nor were the seaman's apprehensions less lively,
when night surprised him with some valuable cargo in the neighbourhood of
the pirates' haunts. Every rock, each tree, and bush became an object of
dread; the very ripple of the waves on the shingle a sound of alarm. To
his terrified fancy, a few leafless and projecting branches assumed the
appearance of muskets, a point of rock became the prow of one of those
light, sharp-built boats in which the Uzcoques were wont to dart like
seabirds upon their prey; and, invoking his patron saint, the frightened
sailor crossed himself, and with a turn of the rudder brought his vessel
yet nearer to the Venetian galleys that escorted the convoy.

At the cry "Uzcoque" the slender active Albanian grasped his fire-lock,
with rage and hatred expressed on his bearded countenance: the phlegmatic
Turk sprang in unwonted haste from his carpet; his pipe and coffee were
neglected, his women and treasures secured in the harem, while he shouted
for the Martellossi,[3] and slipping them like dogs from a leash, sent
them to the encounter of their foes on the devastated plains of Cardavia.
In the despatches from Madrid, from the ministers of that monarch on whose
dominions the sun never set, to his ambassadors, the name of these seven
hundred outlaws occupied a frequent and prominent place. But by none were
the Uzcoques more feared and detested than by the greyheaded doge and
senators of the Ocean Queen, the sea-born city, before whose cathedral the
colours of three kingdoms fluttered from their crimson flagstaffs; and the
few young Venetians in whose breasts the remembrance of their heroic
ancestors yet lived, blushed for their country's degradation when they
beheld her rulers braved and insulted by a band of sea-robbers.