206 ROADS AND TRAVELLING I'AKT 111. 



in one week. A score of the rioters were apprehended, 

 and while on their way to York Castle a rescue was 

 attempted, when the soldiers were under the necessity 

 of firing, and many persons were killed and wounded. 



The prejudices entertained against the turnpikes were 

 so strong, that in some places the country people would 

 not even use the improved roads after they were made. 1 

 For instance, the driver of the Marlborough coach obsti- 

 nately refused to use the New Bath road, but stuck to 

 the old waggon-track, called " Ramsbury." He was an 

 old man, he said : his grandfather and father had driven 

 the aforesaid way before him, and he would continue in 

 the old track till death. 2 Petitions were also presented 

 to Parliament against the extension of turnpikes ; but 

 here the opposition was of a much less honest character 

 than that of the misguided and prejudiced country folks. 

 The agriculturists in the neighbourhood of the metropolis, 

 having secured the advantages which the turnpike-roads 

 first constructed had conferred upon them, desired to 

 retain a monopoly of their improved means of commu- 

 nication. They alleged that if turnpike-roads were 

 extended into the remoter counties, the greater cheapness 

 of labour there would enable the distant farmers to sell 

 their grass and corn cheaper in the London market than 

 themselves, and that thus they would be ruined. 3 This 

 opposition, however, did not prevent the progress of 

 turnpike and highway legislation; and we find that, 

 from 1760 to 1774, no fewer than four hundred and 

 fifty-two Acts were passed for making and repairing 

 highways. Nevertheless the roads of the kingdom 

 long continued in a very unsatisfactory state, chiefly 



1 The Blandford waggoner said, I op and down the country." Iiolx-risV 



" lloads had but one object lor r 4 Social History of the Southern Coun- 



\v a LIL:; on-driving. He required but j ties.' 



four-foot width in a lane, and all the 2 ' Gentleman's Magazine' for IV- 



ivst might go to the devil." He added, cumber, 1752. 



"The gentry ought to stay at home, 3 Adam Smith's ' \\Yalth <>f Xa- 



aud be d d, and not run gossiping tions,' book i., chap, xi., part i. 



