PROCEEDINGS OF THE POLYTECHNIC ASSOCIATION. 373 



he calls aristocrats, who recognize as duties what he treats as little differ- 

 ent from almsgiving. Now, it is time for us to consider whether our insti- 

 tution has not been retarded by thus refusing honor where it is due, and 

 bestowing it where it is not due. Had we fulfilled these duties of gentle- 

 men, thus understood, might we not have had cleaner and better pave- 

 ments, better omnibuses and rail cars, and other comforts and luxuries, 

 instead of civil war and the prospect of burdensome taxation, if not of evils 

 incomparably worse ? 



In this sense of the terms I use, I condemn the objections of those who 

 discburage the cooperation I propose, by saying that inventors will not 

 agree; capitalists will not back them; professional engineers will not, in 

 their way, help to perfect plans; and that competition is theory, and indi- 

 vidual enterprise is the force. I have studied this subject as thoroughly 

 as any one I know; and I predict pecuniary losses to each and every 

 invention now in the field, if this illiberal course is persisted in. But if a 

 liberal union is formed, even with a small capital, I predict that it will be 

 rewarded as governments intend it should be; it will not fail to share in 

 the benefit it confers on mankind. 



Mr. Dibben. — I think, Mr. Chairman, thei^e is no subject on which a little 

 scientific information spread through the community would be of more 

 value than the construction of highways. A large portion of the labor 

 devoted to the construction and repair of roads might be more wisely 

 directed. In New Jersey there are long pieces of sandy road which might 

 be made perfectly hard and smooth by the application of a small quantity 

 of clay and marl to the surface, and both the clay and marl are to be found 

 in abundance in the immediate vicinity. In some places the road has been 

 made hard by the droppings of marl from the carts as it was being carted 

 from its beds to the fields for manure. Near Rondout, in this State, is a 

 road a mile and a half in length, in which a smooth track is formed for 

 each wheel by laying flat stones, the track between for the horse being 

 formed of gravel. The difiiculty of keeping the wheels on thesr'e flat stones 

 prevented this road from being successful. 



The Chairman (Mr. Veeder). — The managers of the plank road running 

 from Albany to Cherry Valley tried several experiments which furnished 

 a good deal of instruction in regard to this class of roads. They first 

 planked the road with hemlock four inches thick, and when the hemlock 

 planks wore out they laid down beech plank three inches thick. After- 

 ward the whole road was planked with oak three inches in thickness. It 

 was found that the hemlock lasted seven years, the beech has now lasted 

 four years and is still good, and the oak plank in less than three years was 

 all decayed. Experience has shown that where thei-e is travel enough to 

 wear out a plank road it will prove profitable, but if it rots out it will not 

 pay. I have had some experience in road making for myself, and I am 

 satisfied that the matter of most importance is thorough draining. Some 

 years since I had charge of the work of repairing a road in which there 

 Avas a very soft, bad place at the foot of a hill. I had the earth removed 

 to the depth of some two feet and coarse stones thrown into the bottom of 

 the trench, covering them with gravel. This spot has ever since been the 

 best portion of the road. I would suggest the use of drain tile, laid in 



