CHAPTER X 



ROADS 



ROADS of some sort must have existed for many 

 thousand years. We cannot imagine ourselves 

 without paths. As soon as there were any 

 inhabitants at all in a country there must have 

 been roads, although perhaps they were only 

 tracks across the plains and forests to the huts 

 and caves where the folk of those days hid 

 themselves away. Even animals make their 

 roads ; there are sheep-tracks on the downs and 

 fells, there are rabbit-runs through walls and 

 hedges, even the little ants make tiny tracks in 

 our lawns and paths as they run ceaselessly to 

 and fro to their homes. Roads like these, that 

 grow up naturally, are never straight ; they are 

 quite different to the railway lines, or the roads 

 and streets that are laid out and made by 

 engineers and builders. They bend to one side 

 or another, perhaps to avoid some fallen tree 

 or big stone which has long since disappeared ; 

 they will go up to a place where a farm- 

 house or inn once stood, and down towards the 

 river where there has been a ford or a mill. 

 They will sometimes go right out on to high 

 open ground, as though to command a view of 



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