heir banners, to shout themselves hoarse for the Nicolotti, for San
Nicolo and San Raffaele, for _Piero, gastaldo grande_, for Venezia, for
San Marco, with "Bravi," "Felicitazioni," and every possible childish
demonstration of delight.

Should not the Nicolotti--blessed be the Madonna!--always overcome the
Castellani with Piero at their head, in those party battles on the
bridges which had now grown to be as serious a factor in the lives of
the gondoliers of Venice as they were disturbing to the citizens at
large, and therefore the more to the glory of the combatants?

Was he not their own representative--elected by the very voice of the
people, as in those lost days of their freedom the doges had been? And
did not the rival faction so stand in awe of the new gastaldo that from
the moment of his nomination there had been disaffection in their ranks?

And now, as they shouted around him, many a sturdy red cap tossed his
badge disdainfully into the throng and snatched a black bonnet from the
nearest head to wave it aloft with cries of "the black cap! The
Nicolotti! Viva San Nicolo!"

And again, when Piero essayed to prove himself equal to his honors, his
few words dropped without sound upon the storm of vivas--"We do not want
talking for our gastaldo--but doing!"

Since this happening Piero had been indeed a great man among the
people--a popular idol, with a degree of power difficult to estimate by
one unfamiliar with the customs and traditions of Venice; holding the
key, practically, to all the traghetti of Venice, since even before this
sweeping disaffection of the Castellani the Nicolotti were invariably
acknowledged to be the more powerful faction, so that now it was a
trifling matter to coerce a rival offending traghetto; and gondoliers,
private and public, were, to say the least, courteous toward these
nobles of the Nicolotti, who were dealing with tosi as never before in
the history of Venice.

In truth, but for those unknown _observors_ in secret service to the
terrible Inquisition,--an army sixty thousand strong, one third of the
entire population of Venice,--impressed from nobles, gondoliers,
ecclesiastics, and people of every grade and profession, from every
quarter of the city, and charged to lose nothing of any detail that
might aid the dreaded chiefs of the Inquisition in their silent and
fearful work--the power of Piero would have been virtually limitless.
These three terrible unknown chiefs of the In