In my view The Story of the Greek Slave is the best scary short story by Captain Frederick Marryat (1791-1848) given its dark themes and high-level of writing. Wine from the casks taste better after a corpse has been sitting in it? To which the master replies "It certainly has more body . . .." This tale wasn't originally published as a short horror story. It has been extracted from Chapter II of The Pacha of Many Tales that was published by Marryat in the Metropolitan Magazine from 1831-1835. It was presented as a series of tales that drew strong parallels to the New Arabian Nights. Marryat was no stranger to horror and the supernatural. He would later pen the haunting novel called The Phantom Ship. The high writing and horror the reader experiences as the people drink from the corpse caskets places "The Story of the Greek Slave" as the 19th best scary short story published from 1800-1849.
