584 PRACTICE OF AGRICULTURE. Part III. 



the fields on each side ; here all attempts at drainage, or even common repairs, seem 

 to be quite out of the question, and by much the most judicious and economical mode 

 will be to remove the whole road into the field which is on the sunny side of it. 

 (^JExam. before the House of Commons, ^c. ) 



3620. In the junction of roads, whether of a by-road with a principal road, or of two 

 by or principal roads, their respective levels ought, if possible, to be the same, and the 

 materials ought to be rather broader than usual at the point of turning. In like manner 

 the communication of fields by gates ought to be carefully managed, so as not to injure 

 the public road, the footpath, the water-table, or the inner drain. All gates should open 

 inwards to the fields, and not to the road. 



3621. That plantations of trees should not be made close to roads, all are agreed. What 

 the distance ought to be must depend on the elevation of the country, the soil and sub- 

 soil, the breadth of the road, its direction, whether the plantation is to be made on the 

 north or south side of the road, its thickness, kind of tree, &c. An elevated situation is 

 always more exposed to the wind than a level or hollow ; and a dry soil and subsoil will 

 always, other circumstances being the same, have a favourable effect on the roads which 

 pass over them. A broad road, and a road winding in its direction, have chances of the 

 direct influence of the sun and wind, according to the width of the former and obliquity 

 of the latter ; a road running north and south, though planted closely on both sides, will 

 enjoy the sun during a part of every day in the year ; one running east and west, planted 

 on the south side with trees forty feet high, will enjoy no sun but through the interstices of 

 the branches during the three winter months. Supposing the average height of the sun 

 from ten to two o'clock during these three months to be 20 degrees, then a tree forty 

 feet high will throw a shadow every day during that period, upwards of 1 00 feet long, 

 which may show that no plantation should be made nearer the south sides of roads than 

 80 or 100 feet. On the north-east and north-west sides, they may be nearer, accord- 

 ing to the elevation and natural tendency to dryness of the site, and also taking into 

 consideration whether the trees are evergreens, and with or without underwood. The 

 least injurious trees are single rows trained to high stems, properly pruned in, or 

 foreshortened. 



3622. The jrreparation of the base of a road, for the reception of the metals or hard 

 materials, is a matter of primary importance. Marshal, Edgeworth, and some other 

 writers, with almost all practical men, seem to have entertained much less enlightened 

 notions on this subject than M'Adam. 



3623. Marshal's preparation consists in striking off the protuberances, and filling up 

 the hollow parts ; the footpath and the higher side of the soft road being raised with the 

 earth which is required to be taken off the bed of the hard road, whose base or founda- 

 tion ought to be formed with peculiar care. Every part is required to be firm and sound, 

 dry earth, or hard materials, being rammed into every hollow and yielding part. In a 

 dry situation, as across a gravelly or stony height, little more, he says, is required, than 

 to remove the surface movild, and lay bare the rock or bed of gravel beneath it ; and 

 then to give the indurate base a round or a shelving form, as the lying of the ground 

 may require. In this way, a travelable road may be made, and kept up, at one tenth of 

 the expense incurred by the ordinary practice in this case j which is to gather up the 

 surface-soil into a ridge, and, on this soft spongy bed, to lay, coat after coat, some hard 

 materials, fetched perhaps from a distance. 



3624. A soft bed is now found by far the best; and M'Adam has proved, in the case of 

 part of the road between Bridgewater and Cross, that a stratum of hard materials covering 

 a morass will last longer than a similar stratum laid on rock : indeed, it may be questioned 

 whether a properly made road on a bog, which yields by its elasticity, will not last longer 

 than one on a firm surface. We have been told by a gentleman of some experience in 

 road-making, that in Ireland this is actually found to be the case. " Precisely," as Fry 

 observes, " for the same cause that a stone placed upon a woolpack would bear a greater 

 pressm-e before it would be broken, than it would if placed on an anvil." {Essay on Wheel 

 Carriages, ^c. App. 129.) 



3625. Covering the base of an unsound road with faggots, branches, furze, or heath, is 

 recommended by Edgeworth. Flat stones, he adds, if they can be had, should then be 

 laid over the faggots, and upon them stones of six or seven pounds' weight, and, lastly, a 

 coat of eight or ten inches of pounded stone. If the practicability of consolidating a mass 

 of stones each of six or eight ounces' weight and under, so as to act as one plate or floor- 

 ing, be admitted, then the faggots and flat stones must at least be useless, and the stones 

 of six or seven pounds' weight injurious ; because, whenever the upper stratum had worn 

 down a few inches, some of these stones, and eventually the greater number, would be 

 worked up to the surface, and the road destroyed, or put in a state to require lifting, 

 breaking, and relaying. 



3626. A basement of trees, bavins, or bushes, is made use of by Walker when the ground 

 is very soft. They carry off the water previously to the materials of the road being so 



