RAILWAYS, HIGHWAYS, AND CANALS. 



influence in preventing the adoption of better lines of road j whereas,, 

 if that trade were like other tradesmen, and there is no good reason 

 why it should not, the house of entertainment could follow the new 

 line with as little inconvenience as the farrier's shop does at present. 

 There are arguments in favour of a more general superintendence of 

 the great lines of road, especially than that under which they are at 

 present. 



There is another and a very important general advantage arising 

 from the adopting of new lines of road upon the principle of modern 

 engineering. The old lines were made when the lower and richer 

 parts of the country were marshy, and, besides being rendered more 

 difficult by slopes than if they had been laid further down, they 

 pass over the least productive parts of the country ; and, therefore 

 these, when made, are the least needed, and the most easily kept 

 in repair. The great farmers who cultivate the rich bottoms, are 

 thus subjected to a considerable expense in the use of their men 

 and teams, and also in keeping their farm-roads in repair; all of 

 which would be saved if the road were carried along the level. The 

 smaller occupiers, who live partly by the land, and partly by the 

 road, are by the same means driven to those places where their 

 crops are of the smallest quantity and worst quality, though reared 

 at the greatest expense. No doubt the road brings population to 

 the bleak moors, but where there are no means, as manufactories, in 

 which that population can be employed, the wretchedness of the 

 whole accommodations of these people plainly shows that they would 

 be better somewhere else. 



These and many other considerations which will suggest them- 

 selves to the reader, all tend to prove that the public roads of a 

 country, especially of a country where facility of intercourse for all 

 distances, whether long or short, is of such primary importance as in 

 Great Britain, ought not to be parcelled out into petty local admi- 

 nistrations, unconnected with each other, and independent of the 

 public ; but that they should be under the public itself, through the 

 medium of its general and responsible government, in order that per- 

 sons of all ranks may be equally accommodated, all interests equally 

 protected, and all improvements both of the road itself and of the 

 district over which it passes, dully promoted and encouraged. Be- 

 fore, however, we can enter fully and advantageously into the subject 

 of these roads, we must wait for the second part of Mr. Grahame's 

 treatise, which he promises shall soon make its appearance. 



Canals and railways are not, from their pecular nature, so generally 

 useful to the public as roads. To persons walking, riding on horse- 

 back, or in their own carriages, or using their own ordinary machines 

 and domestic animals, which are useful on common paths, those means 

 of intercourse are of no value whatever ; and as such parties must 

 ever constitute the great bulk of the people, a canal or a railway can 

 never become, in the most general sense of the term, a public work. 

 A ship-canal, by means of which a circuitous or dangerous naviga- 

 tion is avoided, comes, indeed, in a country somewhat dependent 

 on its marine as Britain is, very nearly within the peculiar descrip- 

 tion of a public work, and, with a government peculiarly responsible, 



