ROADS AND ROAD-MAKING. 553 



Repairing Roads. Another very serious mistake in mending our roads, or rather 

 in attempting to mend them, is to plow up the side ditches and throw the material, sods, sand 

 and manure, which the rains have washed off into them, back into the center of the drive- way. 

 Absurd as this practice appears, it is quite too common in our country roads, and that, too, in 

 many cases where good road-material is easily accessible. The consequence of it is, that the 

 first rains convert this loose organic material, vastly better for a top-dressing for grass than 

 for the surface of a road, into a perfect slough of mud, and a hard rain washes it back into the 

 ditch. In a dry season this material becomes a perfect bed of dust, annoying to the traveler, 

 destructive to vehicles, and about as bad as the mud itself. No strength of language is ade 

 quate to do justice to the iniquity of this bad practice, and the surveyor who allows it ought 

 to be complained of as an enemy to society. 



Nothing is more certain, nothing better established by the experience of engineers and 

 of practical men, than that a solid and unyielding foundation is one of the first requisites for 

 a good road. And yet, to throw such material as sods and sand and loam into the road 

 from the sides, even if it is designed to cover it with a coating of gravel, is utterly destruct 

 ive to the foundation of the road. All such stuff should be carefully thrown out of the 

 road-bed, as the first and most important step in laying the foundation. The loose stones 

 that have from time to time been picked from the surface and thrown aside to be an eyesore 

 to every man of taste who travels there, constitute an infinitely better road-material than the 

 soil on which they lie. Sods and turf are often deceptively tough, and they seem &quot;so 

 handy &quot; to fill a hole or a rut with, that they are used for the purpose without considering that 

 they rapidly decay and work down into soft mud. But some go to the other extreme and fill 

 up the deep ruts with stones, put in and covered up in such a way as to conceal them at first, 

 but so that they never wear uniformly with the rest of the road, but appear in hard ridges 

 and bumps. 



And here we must condemn the promiscuous use of the plow and the scraper in repair 

 ing roads. Common as they are, they should never be used in crowning up a road from the 

 sides, and perhaps the only place where they should ever be tolerated on the road is in 

 loosening and removing the tops of hills to reduce the grade by taking off the gravel, for 

 their work, though large in quantity, is very poor in quality, and, in fact, destructive to the 

 condition of the road ; for the one breaks up the surface and the shoulders of the road which 

 time and travel may have solidified, while the scraper drags up from the side ditches the 

 soft alluvial matter previously washed into them, and leaves it upon the road, the very place 

 of all others where it is never wanted and never should be allowed. 



We shall find, on inquiry, that the most common reason given as to why this vegetable 

 matter is used is, that there is no suitable material handy. In some cases, like sandy loca 

 tions and where long stretches of country occur, destitute of rocks and gravel, there is, no 

 doubt, some shadow of reason in this excuse; but we have often heard it where plenty of 

 good gravel could be had, within a hundred rods, almost for the carting. And how easy it 

 would be, in most sections, to remedy the difficulty by employing men by the year, to be 

 always on hand to keep up the roads and to keep an abundance of material, crushed rocks, 

 screened gravel, etc., on hand for use in various parts of the town. 



Would it not be better economy for some towns to invest a few hundred dollars in a 

 good stone-crusher and a heavy roller, to be kept on the town-farm for use on the roads, than 

 to pay men a dollar or two dollars a day to stand out their road-tax, leaning upon their hoe- 

 handles upon the road ? There are stone-crushers that will crush a ton of boulders an hour 

 with a ten-horse-power engine, with the help of three or four men to throw the stones into 

 the hopper and clear away the fragments. 



Crushed stone forms one of the best materials for a road-bed, being firm and unyielding, 

 and, at the same time, such as is easily kept in repair. A heavy roller, for solidifying the 



