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the use of the iron cyliner for compressing the materials of a 

 new road, and to minute attention to daily repairs. It is stated 

 that by the use of the cylinder the road is presented at once in 

 a good traveling condition ; the wear of the materials is less 

 than by the old method of gradually consolidating them by the 

 travel ; the cost of repairs during the first years is diminished ; 

 it gives to the road-covering a more uniform thickness, and ad- 

 mits of it being thinner than in the usual method. 



" Materials and Repairs. — The material for broken-stone 

 roads should be hard and durable. For the bottom layer a 

 soft stone, or a mixture of hard and soft, may be used, but on 

 the surface none but the hardest stone will withstand the action 

 of the wheels. The stone should be carefully broken into frag- 

 ments of as nearly as cubical a form as possible, and be cleansed 

 from dirt and all very small fragments. The broken stone 

 should be kept in depots at convenient points along the line of 

 the road for repairs. 



"Too great attention cannot be bestowed upon keeping the 

 road surface free from an accumulation of mud, and even of 

 dust. It should be constantly cleaned by scraping and sweep- 

 ing. The repairs should be daily made by adding fresh ma- 

 terial upon all points where hollows or ruts commence to form. 

 It is recommended by some that, when fresh material is added, 

 the surface on which it is spread should be broken with a 

 pick to the depth of half an inch to an inch, and the fresh ma- 

 terial be well settled by ramming, a small quantity of clean 

 sand being added to make the stone pack better. When not 

 daily repaired by persons whose sole business it is to keep the 

 road in good order, general repairs should be made in the 

 months of October and April, by removing all accumulations 

 ,of mud, cleaning out the side channels and other drains, and 

 adding fresh material where requisite. 



" The importance of keeping the road surface at all times 

 free from an accumulation of mud and dust, and of preserving 

 the surface in a uniform state of evenness, by the daily addition 

 of fresh material wherever the wear is sufficient to call for it, 

 cannot be too strongly insisted upon. Without this constant 

 supervision, the best constructed road will, in a short time, be 

 unfit for travel, and with it the weakest may at all times be 

 kept in a tolerable fair state." 



