I had got a rough chart from the Surveyor-General, and filled up such parts as I knew, and over all I spread a network of lines which meant my ways of sending news.

For instance, to get to a man in Essex county, the word would be passed by Middle Plantation to York Ferry.

Thence in an Indian's canoe it would be carried to Aird's store on the Mattaponey, from which a woodman would take it across the swamps to a clump of hemlocks.

There he would make certain marks, and a long-legged lad from the Rappahannock, riding by daily to school, would carry the tidings to the man I wanted.

And so forth over the habitable dominion.