What came nearest to the hearts of all was the loss of Dorothea Bradford,who, when all the men of the party were absent on an exploring tour,accidentally fell over the side of the vessel and sunk in the deepwaters. What this loss was to the husband and the little company ofbrothers and sisters appears by no note or word of wailing, merely by asimple entry which says no more than the record on a gravestone, that,"on the 7th of December, Dorothy, wife of William Bradford, fell over andwas drowned."

That much-enduring company could afford themselves few tears. Earthlyhaving and enjoying was a thing long since dismissed from theircalculations. They were living on the primitive Christian platform; they"rejoiced as though they rejoiced not," and they "wept as though theywept not," and they "had wives and kidren as though they had them not,"or, as one of themselves expressed it, "We are in all places strangers,pilgrims, travelers and sojourners; our dwelling is but a wandering, ourabiding but as a fleeting, our home is nowhere but in the heavens, inthat house not made with arms, whose builder and maker is God."

When one of their number fell they were forced to do as soldiers in thestress of battle--close up the ranks and press on.