234 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



moving on a good, level road, at four miles an hour, for eight con- 

 secutive hours, is reduced about one-half, or to sixty pounds ; 

 while a velocity of eight miles an hour brings the draught power 

 down to one-fourth, or to thirty pounds. 



How to Secure Good, Permanent Roads. 



Having glanced at what constitutes a really good, permanent 

 road, let us next consider how, without attempting a radical revo- 

 lution, roads of this character may be gradually secured in the 

 difi'ereut parts of the State. 



It is clear that our present expenditures ought to give us better 

 roads ; it is clear that our roads ought to iraprore j^ear by year, 

 becoming cheaper and cheaper of maintenance ; but it is also clear 

 that with only the old feudal policy of personal service as now, 

 with the country divided into minute districts, and with no gen- 

 eral, intelligent supervision, very little in the way of steady, 

 durable improvement can be cfiected. What then should be 

 done ? What reasonably attempted in the line of legislation ? 



The political unit should always be large enough for the most 

 efficient administration of public affairs — of those affairs which are 

 really public, such as the construction and maintenance of roads. 

 Now, the size of this political unit can never be constant, but 

 must vary according to the work to be done ; indeed, must often 

 vary with diflferent parts of the same work ; for centralization is 

 not an absolute, but a relative term, and what would be effective 

 centralization in one instance, would be wasteful diffusion of 

 executive power in another. That degree of centralization wliich 

 leads to despotism and produces intellectual inertia among the 

 people, should be, of course, always shunned. But the cry of 

 centralization is often raised against a new thing, simply because 

 there is an absolute dearth of all clearly defined, valid objections. 

 In the natural world diffusion is the characteristic of decaj'- and 

 death ; there is no life and growth without some degree of con- 

 solidation ; it is much the same in the social and political world. 



Now, the building of roads and their subsequent care demands 

 a larger political unit than the ordinary " district " of to-day, 

 with its fifteen or twenty families. 



In the first place, there is not a district, whose roads are for the 

 service and advantage of the district alone. They are for the ser- 

 vice of all the adjacent neighborhoods, and oftentimes people 

 living far away have a direct and constant interest in them. They 



