[144] _The Rev. Calvin Fairbank During Slavery Times_, pp. 24, 25; see also the _Chicago Tribune_, Jan. 29, 1893, p. 33. [145] Conversation with James W. Torrence, Northwood, Logan Co., O., Sept. 22, 1894. [146] Letter of William I. Bowditch, Boston, Mass., April 5, 1893. The routes were very far from being straight. They are perhaps best described by the word zigzag. The exigencies that determined in what direction an escaping slave should go during any particular part of his journey were, in the nature of the case, always local. The ultimate goal was Canada, but a safe passage was of greater importance than a quick one. When speed would contribute safety the guide would make a long trip with his charge, or perhaps resort to the steam railroad; but under ordinary circumstances, in those regions where the Underground Railroad was most patronized, a guide had almost always a choice between two or more routes; he could, as seemed best at the time, take the right-hand road to one station, or the left-hand road to another. In truth, the underground paths in these regions formed a great and intricate network, and it was in no small measure because the lines forming the meshes of this great system converged and branched again at so many stations that it was almost an impossibility for slave-hunters to trace their negroes through even a single county without finding themselves on the wrong trail. It was a common stratagem in times of special emergency to switch off travellers from one course to another, or to take them back on their track and then, after a few days of waiting, send them forward again. It is, then, proper to say that zigzag was one of the regular devices to blind and throw off pursuit. It served moreover to avoid unfriendly localities. It seems probable that the circuitous land route from Toledo to Detroit was an expedient of this sort, for slave-owners and their agents were often known to be on the lookout along the direct thoroughfare between the places named. The two routes between Millersburgh and Lodi in northern Ohio are explained by the statement that the most direct route, the western one, fell under suspicion for a while, and in the meantime a more circuitous path was followed through Holmesville and Seville.[149] [147] Letter of John Weldon, Dwight, Ill., Nov. 7, 1895. [148] _History of Darke County, Ohio_, p. 332 _et seq._ [149] Letter of Thomas L. Smith, Fredericksburg, Wayne Co., O., Oct. 6, 1894.