I can never explain it.

These poor girls were more to me than loving sisters.

They turned the black night of my desolate existence into sunshine, and they were perpetually devising some sweet little surprise--some little thing which would please me and add additional brightness to our daily lives.

This dreadful thing happened many years ago, but to this day, and to the day of my death, I feel sure I shall suffer agonies of grief and remorse (I blame myself for not having forbidden them to go in the canoe) for this terrible catastrophe.
After we returned to the land, I haunted the sea-shore for hours, hoping to see the bodies rise to the surface; but I watched in vain.

When at length the full magnitude of the disaster dawned upon me, despair--the utter abandonment of despair--filled my soul for the first time.