No. 4.] COUNTRY ROADS. 233 



whether the taxpayers are being blundered or cheated out 

 of their money. 



M'Adam complained bitterly in his time of the misappro- 

 priation of road funds. He found those in authorhty too ig- 

 norant to govern properly ; and men are saying now that our 

 streets furnish fields for the expert politician rather than for 

 the expert road-maker. The records of boodle governments 

 could never be so black without engineering sharpers to 

 figure for them. And the worst of our predicament is, we 

 are often led to hound the honest man to death, while we let 

 malefactors go free. The only remedy is for the whole 

 people to study the highway to the bottom, so that bogus 

 operators may be restrained or detected on the spot. The 

 art of road making in common schools would make a good 

 foundation for political economy in high schools. 



The amateur road student will not understand the forces 

 that are moving us, without considering the rise of road 

 machinery, and a keen study of its trade circulars. While 

 metropolitan cities are discovering — by the shrewd obser- 

 vations of some common laborer — that the broad tread of 

 the weightiest steam roller will not pop toads in a sixteen- 

 inch mass of " even-sized stone," — half cubic air, — it dawns 

 upon the minds of sharp road machinists that the stones must 

 be applied in layers so thin that they can be rolled separately 

 or crushed flat, and partly in powder, for which the steam 

 roller is said to be indispensable. 



At the same time, the maiden village (with a lot of suspi- 

 cious farmers in her composition) , beginning to think of 

 being a city some day, requires a different treatment to 

 make trade good. There a single thin layer of broken 

 stone, in the form of "an arch over the clay," is recom- 

 mended. This looks " scientific," makes a better road for a 

 little while, — till the clay begins to break up, ■ — and " pays 

 well" for -the beginners of the "resurfacing" business. 

 But every one should remember these are no fair tests of 

 the principles of M'Adam, or of the far older truths in 

 geologic deposits, always open to the study of peasant 

 and scholar. 



Without detracting at all from the just deserts of enter- 

 prising road machinists, it is evident now, as in M'Adam's 



