after they were past
Wintertonness, a few leagues; some of them, whose masters were a
little more wary than the rest, or perhaps, who made a better
judgment of things, or who were not so far out as the rest, tacked,
and put back in time, and got safe into the roads; but the rest
pushing on in hopes to keep out to sea, and weather it, were by the
violence of the storm driven back, when they were too far embayed
to weather Wintertonness as above, and so were forced to run west,
everyone shifting for themselves as well as they could; some run
away for Lynn Deeps, but few of them (the night being so dark)
could find their way in there; some, but very few, rode it out at a
distance; the rest, being above 140 sail, were all driven on shore
and dashed to pieces, and very few of the people on board were
saved: at the very same unhappy juncture, a fleet of laden ships
were coming from the north, and being just crossing the same bay,
were forcibly driven into it, not able to weather the Ness, and so
were involved in the same ruin as the light fleet was; also some
coasting vessels laden with corn from Lynn and Wells, and bound for
Holland, were with the same unhappy luck just come out to begin
their voyage, and some of them lay at anchor; these also met with
the same misfortune, so that, in the whole, above 200 sail of
ships, and above a thousand people, perished in the disaster of
that one miserable night, very few escaping.
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