RURAL ENGINEERING. 471 
citizens resident in the district to be benefitted, who will in the existing order of 
things have charge of its construction and by tax pay its cost. The authorities 
say if the people want a road let them have it. So the farmers have such a road 
as they can make. It would be inconvenient to spoil any one's quarter section, 
therefore it is rarely a direct road, for the same reason it takes a rough and 
tumble course over hill and valley along section or quarter-section lines. It is a 
public road, for the public has consented to its creation. If it become much of 
thoroughfare, it falls but little short of being a public nuisance, by reason of its 
heavy grades and want of direction. For instance, it is the route from a town in 
the northwest of the county to one in the southeast, and traverses two sides of 
each section in the line. Of streams the county takes no cognizance except to 
bridge them as cheaply as possible, and regret that the bridging costs so much, 
and has to be replaced every few years because of a wash-out. So much for the 
present arrangements. It is expensive, inconvenient, and does not fill the re- 
quirements of a good road. The county surveyor has been called on to stake 
out the road after the "location has been determined." He is the only ore 
connected with the enterprise, whose profession would lead him to know the 
high order of talent required to locate a good road. Dr. Lardner says, " I do not 
know that I could suggest any one problem to an engineer, which would require 
a greater exertion of scientific skill and practical knowledge than laying out a 
road." Our authorities are taking no steps to secure this great skill and knowl- 
edge in behalf of the people. 
If more were made out of the office of county surveyor, so that that officer 
should have greater authority in the matter, as the only county officer represent- 
ing the department of engineering, it might prove a great benefit to the people 
on the subject of roads. His office should show the position and the profile of 
every mile of road in the county, and keep statistics from which roads could be 
classified according to their traffic and expenditures made on them in proportion 
to their needs. 
The necessities of a new country have led to the existing state of things ; but 
it is not necessary to perpetuate it. In behalf of the roads there should be a public 
officer in every county who should have authority in matters of locating and 
making roads, and by whom specifications should be made of the cost before it 
is undertaken as a public charge, even the unit of our population, the road dis- 
trict would obtain a better value for its labor by a competent direction, which 
now it does not have. 
There are some laws on the subjects ot rivers, streams, and drains. Of the 
first and second, these laws have reference for the most part to the preservation 
of fish, and seem to have emanated from the clubs of sportsmen. While the 
laws about drains look to compelling owners on the lower level to open ditches 
across their farms for the passage of the surplus water from the higher level, /. e. 
because A, B and C on the divide have ditched their flat land, D, E and F shall 
have the best of their land overflowed or crossed by gaping gullies, and the 
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