466 HISTORY OF COIIASSET. 



the same whose superscription I have quoted, — her child in her 

 sister's arms, as if the sister had meant to be found thus ; and 

 within three days after, the mother died from the effect of that 

 sight. 



We turned from this and walked along the rocky shore. In 

 the first cove were strewn what seemed the fragments of a vessel, 

 in small pieces mixed with sand and seaweed, and great quan- 

 tities of feathers ; but it looked so old and rusty, that I at first 

 took it to be some old wreck which had lain there many years. 

 I even thought of Captain Kidd, and that the feathers were those 

 which sea fowl had cast there ; and perhaps there might be some 

 tradition about it in the neighborhood. I asked a sailor if that 

 was the St. John. He said it was. I asked him where she 

 struck. He pointed to a rock in front of us, a mile from the 

 shore, called the Grampus Rock, and added : — 



" You can see a part of her now sticking up-; it looks like a 

 small boat." 



I saw it. It was thought to be held by the chain-cables and 

 the anchors. I asked if the bodies which I saw were all that 

 were drowned. 



" Not a quarter of them," said he. 



" Where are the rest ? " 



" Most of them right underneath that piece you see." 



It appeared to us that there was enough rubbish to make the 

 wreck of a large vessel in this cove alone, and that it would take 

 many days to cart it off. It was several feet deep, and here and 

 there was a bonnet or a jacket on it. In the very midst of the 

 crowd about this wreck, there were men with carts busily collect- 

 ing the seaweed which the storm had cast up, and conveying it 

 beyond the reach of the tide, though they were often obliged to 

 separate fragments of clothing from it, and they might at any 

 moment have found a human body under it. Drown who might, 

 they did not forget that this weed was a valuable manure. This 

 shipwreck had not produced a visible vibration in the fabric of 

 society. 



About a mile south we could see, rising above the rocks, the 

 masts of the British brig which the St. John had endeavored to 

 follow, which had slipped her cables, and, by good luck, run into 

 the mouth of Cohasset Harbor. A little further along the shore 



