en as were
for landing opposite the town, and with reason, for the tide was rushing
with great force into the river Blythe. Arthur Blackbourne had seized
one of the oars to assist in effecting a landing on that perilous spot.
Elizabeth Younges, who perceived a cable lying athwart the haven,
started up in an agony of terror, caught him by the arm, and entreated
him to desist. Arthur, attributing her opposition to angry excitement of
temper, rudely shook off her hold and exerted a double portion of energy
to accomplish his object, and just at the fatal moment when the men
carelessly let go the rope, impelled the boat into immediate contact
with the obstacle of which Elizabeth was about to warn him. The next
instant all were struggling with the roaring tide. The slumbering
village of Walberswick was startled with the death-shrieks of that
devoted company. The anxious watchers on Southwold cliff, the parents,
relatives, and friends of the hapless voyagers, echoed back their cries
in hopeless despair. Then there was the impulsive rush of men, women,
and children toward the spot where they had seen the boat capsized. In
less than ten minutes the swift-footed neared it, but ere then, the
dread gulf which divides time from eternity had already been passed by
each and all, save one, of those who sailed so gayly from the town that
morn. Lovers and rivals, passengers and crew, were united in a watery
grave. The solitary survivor was Arthur Blackbourne.

The register of Southwold for the year 1616 contains the record of this
tragedy of domestic life, penned with mournful minuteness by the
faithful hand of the bereaved parent of two of the victims,
Christopherus Younges, the Vicar of Southwold: we copy it verbatim from
the tear-stained page.

"The names of those who were drowned and found again. They were drowned
in the haven coming from _Donwich fayer_, on St. James's day in a
_bote_, by reason of one cable lying _overwharf_ the haven, for by
reason the men that brought them down was so negligent, that when they
were _redie_ to come ashore the _bote_ broke _lose_, and so the force of
the tide carried the _bote_ against the cable and so overwhelmed. The
number of them were xxii, but they were not all found. The widow Robson,
Johne Bates, Mary Yewell, Susan Frost, Margaret Blackbourne and the
widow Taylor, were all buried on the 26th day of July, being all cast
away, coming from _Donwick fayer_, on St. James's daye.

"Widow Poster