USE OF STONE-CRUSIIERS. 53 



glad to funiisli it with six million tons of rock for nothing, and 

 guarantee at the same time that there is no road material in the 

 world equal to it. 



Would it not be better economy for the town to invest a few 

 hundred dollars in a good stone crusher and a heavy roller, to 

 be kept on its 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, we have some about Boston, that will crush a ton of 

 boulders an hour with a ten horse power engine, with the help 

 of three or foi;r men to throw the stones into the hopi)or and 

 clear away the fragments. But, if you can't stand that, a 

 medium laborer can break up from one and a half to two cubic 

 yards of gneiss rock, or from a half to three-quarters of a yard 

 of boulders or cobble stones a day, and it is work that can be 

 done in winter and through stormy weather as well as at any 

 other time. 



Blake's stone-crusher, a machine of immense strength and 

 efficiency, will crush seven hundred and fifty cubic feet of the 

 liardest trap boulders into the best road metal in ten hours, 

 with a nine horse power engine, and it has been known to break 

 a hundred cubic feet in a single hour. This machine reduces 

 the cost of hand labor for the same work about eighty per cent., 

 and then tiiere is the engine which can be used for putting out 

 fires when not crushing stones. 



, Well, now, you may say a small town can't afford it. But 

 you can buy a machine of six horse power for S)800, and many 

 a town loses more than that by the misapplication of funds 

 every year, and its roads are growing no better very fast. 



And how easy it would be to make this work the medium of 

 one of the grandest charities which a small town has it in its 

 power to bestow. There are few towns in which cases will not 

 sometimes occur of men either bowed with age, or perhaps 

 overwhelmed with the shadow of some great misfortune, who 

 find themselves on the approach of winter destitute of work, 

 though willing and anxious to do it. Perhaps they have 

 families dependent upon them for the means of comfort. It 

 is as hard, perhaps, for them, as it would be for you or for 

 me, to be driven to the last resort, and apply to the town for 

 help to enable them to get through the winter. A feeling of 



