Here was a second disappointment endured by the same persons, and produced by his failure.

Might it not originate in the same cause?
Had he not designed to cross the river that morning to make some necessary purchases in Jersey?
He had preconcerted to return to his own house to dinner; but, perhaps, some disaster had befallen him.
Experience had taught me the insecurity of a canoe, and that was the only kind of boat which Pleyel used: I was, likewise, actuated by an hereditary dread of water.

These circumstances combined to bestow considerable plausibility on this conjecture; but the consternation with which I began to be seized was allayed by reflecting, that if this disaster had happened my brother would have received the speediest information of it.

The consolation which this idea imparted was ravished from me by a new thought.

This disaster might have happened, and his family not be apprized of it.