The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1 / Page 167 (Color Image)

0167	The Book of Ser Marco Polo : vol.1

WARS OF VENICE AND GENOA

Further outrages on both sides occurred in . 1296. The

Genoese residences at Pera were fired, their great alum works

on the coast of Anatolia were devastated, and Caffa was stormed

and sacked ; whilst on the other hand a number of the

Venetians at Constantinople were massacred by the Genoese,

and Marco Bembo, their Bailo, was flung from a house-top.

Amid such events the fire of enmity between the cities waxed

hotter and hotter.

33. In 1298 the Genoese made elaborate preparations for a

great blow at the enemy, and fitted out a powerful fleet which

they placed under the command of LAMBA DORIA, a Lamba Do-

younger brother of Uberto of that illustrious house, rig's Expe-

dition to the

under whom he had served fourteen years before in the Adriatic.

great rout of the Pisans at Meloria.

The rendezvous of the fleet was in the Gulf of Spezia, as we

learn from the same pithy Genoese poet who celebrated Ayas.

This time the Genoese were bent on bearding St. Mark's Lion

in his own den ; and after touching at Messina they steered

straight for the Adriatic :

IrOE

" Now, as astern Otranto bears,

Pull with a will ! and, please the Lord,

Let them who bragged, with fire and sword, To waste our homesteads, look to theirs !"*

On their entering the gulf a great storm dispersed the fleet.

The admiral with twenty of his galleys got into port at Antivari

on the Albanian coast, and next day was rejoined by fifty-eight

more, with which he scoured the Dalmatian shore, plundering

all Venetian property. Some sixteen of his galleys were still

missing when he reached the island of Curzola, or Scurzola as

the more popular name seems to have been, the Black Corcyra

of the Ancients--the chief town of which, a rich and flourishing

Or entrare con gran vigor,

En De sj5ercrndo aver triuríyho, Queli zerchando inter lo Gorfo Chi menazeram zerclza for

And in the next verse note the pure Scotch use of the word bra :--

Siclzi da Otranto seyartim Quella bra comj3agnia, Per assar in lhavonia

D'Avosto a vinte nove di.

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