286 MASSACHUSETTS AGRICULTURE. 



vided for discharging them of water, to prevent an overflow, or 

 too great a current to the hazard of the road. 



Side ditches should be made wherever required, with suffi- 

 cient capacity and fall to carry away quickly all surface water 

 from the near vicinity of the road, and should have a depth of 

 three feet below the surface. 



Catch-water drains are sometimes necessary to prevent en- 

 croachments of water from neighboring hill-slopes and the sides 

 of excavations. Suitable out-falls for the drains of every de- 

 scription must be provided, or they may become useless, or 

 perhaps destructive of the works they are intended to preserve. 



Culverts. 

 Culverts for carrying streams under the roadway should be 

 of sufficient size, and be set deeply enough not to impede the 

 natural flow of the water, and, if needed, to help drain the soil 

 near and under the road. It would be better always to make 

 them large enough for a person to enter in a stooping posture, 

 so as to clear them of chance obstructions. Small culverts are 

 liable to become choked, when it often becomes necessary to re- 

 move their coverings to be able to clear them. A very common 

 fault is to build them in such a way as to form little ponds on 

 the up-stream side of the road, thus often keeping the embank- 

 ment saturated with water for long periods. 



Effects of too much Moisture on Roads. 



It may be thought that so much care about drainage is un- 

 necessary ; but when we consider that the effect of too much 

 moisture is to soften and loosen the soils and all kinds of mate- 

 rial used for road-covering, it will be perceived that to this 

 cause is mainly attributable the bad character of our roads. 

 The difference in their condition between spring and summer is 

 an evidence of this fact. 



If kept dry at all seasons, the wear of the surface would be 

 very much diminished, and the cost of repairing material con- 

 sequently reduced. 



When the covering of the road is compact and firm, so that 

 the fragments of which it is composed are held fast in place, the 

 wear is necessarily all on the surface, and, if made of good ma- 

 terial, it is very slow ; but let it become loosened and saturated 



