ten o'clock
The day being now Sabbath , and the whole town idle , every body in a manner was down on the beach , to help and mourn as the bodies , one after another , were cast out by the waves . Alas ! few were the better of my provident preparation , and it was a thing not to be described , to see , for more than a mile along the coast , the new-made widows and fatherless bairns , mourning and weeping over the corpses of those they loved . Seventeen bodies were , before ten o'clock , carried to the desolated dwelling of their families ; and when old Thomas Pull , the betheral , went to ring the bell for public worship , such was the universal sorrow of the town , that Nanse Donsie , an idiot natural , ran up the street to stop him , crying , in the voice of a pardonable desperation , `` Wha , in sic a time , can praise the Lord ? '' The calamity of the storm opened and disposed the hearts of the whole town to charity ; and it was a pleasure to behold the manner in which the tide of sympathy flowed towards the sufferers . Nobody went to the church in the forenoon ; but when I had returned home from the shore , several of the council met at my house to confer anent the desolation , and it was concerted among us , at my suggestion , that there should be a meeting of the inhabitants called by the magistrates , for the next day , in order to take the public compassion with the tear in the eye -- which was accordingly done by Mr Pittle himself from the pulpit , with a few judicious words on the heavy dispensation . And the number of folk that came forward to subscribe was just wonderful .