COUXTRT ROADS. 235 



should, therefore, be built and cared for largely with reference to 

 the general service they are to render — with reference to that 

 system of roads to which they belong, which mainly tend to a 

 common business centre — the county town perhaps. Again, the 

 roads in different districts are subjected to very unequal service. 

 How unreasonable, then, even if the wealth were equally distrib- 

 uted, to expend upon the roads of each district in the town an 

 equal percentage of its valuation. How yet more uni-easonable is 

 this procedure, when, as now, the wealth is so unequally distrib- 

 uted. Of two districts, the one wealthy, the other poor, the 

 former usually has the roads which are, by nature, best. District 

 A, for example, has a valuation of $50,000, district B, of $10,000; 

 the roads in A can be kept in good condition with half the labor 

 required by the roads in B ; and yet the expenditure upon the 

 former is five times more than upon the latter. Yet the people of 

 A may have occasion to use the roads iu B more than they use 

 their own, the poor district lying between the wealthy district and 

 the general business centre. All must have seen illustrations of 

 this. Now, it is clearly for the advantage of A to contribute to 

 the roads in B ; but under the district system it cannot do so. 

 For this reason, the district should be at once supplanted by the 

 town, a political unit which is now known, from the study of lan- 

 guage, to have existed even in prehistoric times. Not "only is the 

 town the most ancient, the most enduring of political organi- 

 zations, it is the most efiicient for the management of the greater 

 part of the public business. To this efficiency must, perhaps, be 

 attributed its abiding hold upon popular favor. With the district 

 supplanted by the town, the labor expended on the roads could 

 be more largely expended where it would render the greatest 

 service to locomotion. 



In the second place, the building of roads and the care of them 

 demands a larger political unit than the ordinary district, because 

 they should be vigilantly watched at all times, and the labor upon 

 them should be continuous throughout the year. When they are 

 once built, the prime object should be to "keep up" the roads, 

 not to repair them ; that is to say, roads should never be allowed 

 to get badly out of order in any season, as they often do, when 

 the labor upon Ihem is spasmodic, peiformed once or twice a year, 

 at the convenience of the laborer. Of nothing can it be more 

 truly said than of the care of roads, that " a stitch in time saves 

 nine" — saves in repairs and sometimes in damages assessed by 



