_facetiousness_, which still clings to him, stuck to his post, visiting
the sick, burying the dead, and even, which seems a little superfluous,
preaching and afterwards printing "by request" their funeral sermons. A
brave man, indeed, and one reserved for a tragic end.

In April 1638 the poet's mother died. In the following November the
elder Marvell married a widow lady, but his own end was close upon him.
The earliest consecutive account of this strange event is in Gent's
_History of Hull_ (1735):--"This year, 1640, the Rev. Mr. Andrew
Marvell, Lecturer of Hull, sailing over the Humber in company with
Madame Skinner of Thornton College and a young beautiful couple who were
going to be wedded; a speedy Fate prevented the designed happy union
thro' a violent storm which overset the boat and put a period to all
their lives, nor were there any remains of them or the vessel ever after
found, tho' earnestly sought for on distant shores."

Thus died by drowning a brave man, a good Christian, and an excellent
clergyman of the Reformed Church of England. The plain narrative just
quoted has been embroidered by many long-subsequent writers in the
interests of those who love presentiments and ghostly intimations of
impending events, and in one of these versions it is recorded, that
though the morning was clear, the breeze fair, and the company gay, yet
when stepping into the boat "the reverend man exclaimed, 'Ho for
Heaven,' and threw his staff ashore and left it to Providence to fulfil
its awful warning."

So melancholy an occurrence naturally excited great attention, and long
lingered in local memories. Everybody in Hull knew who was their
member's father.