TENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK— PART X 60r 



road that would last for centuries. Again let me repeat: If we want 

 good roads we must build them. 



I am about through, but before I sit down let me tell you how I found 

 the roads in my native country a few years ago, when I went back there 

 for a visit: I had occasion to travel some 50 miles or more in a stretch, 

 up one valley and down another. Now I don't believe we have a public 

 highway in the county w-ith anything near the traffic that that road had 

 to bear. About one-third of it was used to haul hundreds of thousands of 

 tons of iron ore to the coast every year, besides all the other travel. In- 

 cluding some stops on the way, viewing the scenes of my childhood, it 

 took about a week from one end to the other, in which time it drizzled and 

 rained nearly every day. But a bicycle or auto-car could have skipped the 

 whole distance without any difficulty whatever. It looked more like paved 

 streets — only narrower — than anything we call roads here. The people 

 over there, when they need a road, go to work and build it, and when once 

 built, they have it forever. 



They also have an original way of keeping their highways in repair in 

 that country. The road is divided into stations of different lengths ac- 

 cording to the amount of taxable property of each land owner. These sta- 

 tions were marked off by a square cut granite block, like a monument and 

 planted by the roadside. Each stone was numbered and stated the length 

 of the station to the next one. Some were only a few rods apart, while 

 others might te as far as a quarter of a mile. Each station was assigned 

 to a particular owner who had to keep it in good repair the whole year 

 around and for ever. Now they have as long winters over there as we have 

 here, arid longer, too, and as a rule, several times as much snow'. I in- 

 quired what they do with their roads then to make them passable. I was 

 told that the different neighborhoods clubbed together, built a snowplow 

 and took turns in driving over the allotted distance of road every morn- 

 ing if it was necessary. 



Each district, what we might call a county, has a road inspector 

 whose business it is to see that each landowner keeps his piece of road 

 in prime condition. 



Those main thoroughfares are called Royal roads (Kongsvei) ; and w'ell 

 they may. Any king 6ught to be proud to pass over such roads. 



ROAD LEGISLATION. 



EY L. B. PAKSHAIX. 



(Before Jackson County Farmers' Institute.) 



The subject assigned on the program is Road Legislation, but it seems 

 best to use the limited time at our disposal in treating the Road Legisla- 

 tion of the last general assembly, and this subject we shall sub-divide into 

 two parts, first, the legislation in the 33d general assembly which was ac- 

 tually accomplished, and second, and more important, the legislation which 

 was proposed, which has not been enacted into law. It is hardly worth 



