THE MODERN CEMETERY. 
113 
Telford Highways. 
The following description of the method of con- 
structing a substantial roadway according to ideas 
of Telford will impress the reader as thorough, but 
it suggests an undue and perhaps unnecessary 
thickness of the separate layers and a consequent 
waste of material, says Good Roads. 
A description of the work as done on a road in 
New York city may be useful. The roadbed is 
trimmed to the required form, which is a descent of 
eight inches from the curb along the center strip to 
the outer curb, and the ground is made firm by the 
use of a 6^-ton roller. 
Upon the prepared roadbed a pavement of 
quarry stones is set by hand, the stones being from 
8 to 10 inches in depth, 3 to 6 inches in width and 
not exceeding 14 inches in length, and of as nearly 
a uniform size as possible, with parallel sides. 
The stones are laid lengthwise across the road, 
with the broadest edges down. After being closely 
set together they are firmly wedged by inserting 
and driving down with a bar used for that purpose, 
in all possible places, stones of the same depth 
until every stone is bound and clamped in the 
proper position. 
CROSS-SECTION OF TELFORD. 
The projections of the stones on the top of the 
pavement are then broken off with a light hammer, 
and the spalls worked into the interstices not already 
filled by the process of wedging, by which the 
pavement is reduced to an even surface of eight 
inches. 
Broken stones of gneiss, of a size to pass through 
a ring 2 inches in diameter, are then spread evenly 
over the pavement to such a depth as will make 6 
inches when rolled. This layer is then rolled first 
with a 6^-ton horse roller, so that the steam roller 
can pass over without difficulty, and when thorough- 
ly compact is in readiness for the top layer. 
The top layer is of broken stone of trap rock of 
a size to pass through a ring i inches in diameter, 
spread evenly over to such a depth as will bring the 
surface to the proper grade. After being made 
thoroughly compact screened gravel to the depth of 
about 13^ inches is spread on the top and thorough- 
ly rolled. 
Both the stone and gravel are kept well 
moistened by means of sprinkling carts when the 
rolling is going on, and the gravel, working down 
into the interstices under the roller, consolidates 
the whole material. 
When completed, the entire depth of pavement, 
stone and gravel is 18 inches. 
It has been found impracticable to consolidate 
the stone when placed on the road by the heaviest 
rolling with a 16-ton steam roller without some 
binding material. Hard gravel has been used for 
this purpose as being preferable to loam or other 
material. When the avenue is first thrown open to 
travel, the roadway is kept moist by sprinkling, 
and a man is employed to pick off any stones that 
may be loosened by the feet of horses, and a 2- 
horse roller is kept passing over it until it becomes 
thoroughly compact and smooth. 
The Qrave=Digger. 
There is something terrible about this grim cus- 
todian of our frail elements, this inexorable landlord 
who will sooner or later have the housing of us. 
We would not willingly make a foe of him, and yet 
he can never be a friend. He is like a malignant 
fate, beyond the reach of bribery or propitiation, 
who obtrudes his hobnail boots and clay-stained 
overalls into our most solemn visions; he menaces 
us during our lives, and the lump of earth he flings 
upon our coffins is the final token of his triumph 
and our subjection, Flis rule seems everlasting and 
his power unshakeable. And yet a little cloud has 
risen upon the horizon of the grave-digger, the 
smoke of the crematory. Here is an infringement 
upon vested right which warms to indignation even 
that imperturable man. The unseemly innovation 
makes progress. Verily and indeed its result is to 
the grave-digger an “unthankful ash.” 
Yet at last fate must overtake even the grave- 
digger. Was it accident or retribution that befell 
him once in a country churchyard when he plied his 
task recklessly near one of the great altar tombs 
which our forefathers were wont to rear? He had 
nearly finished his task when, as he stooped at the 
bottom of the grave, the heavy tomb fell in, and, 
like the ungodly recorded by the Psalmist, “he fell 
in the pit he had digged for others.” But the grave- 
digger is dour and stark to the last; and if the dying 
tiger can strike hard, what shall we say of the one 
grave-digger whom the accidents of fortune are re- 
corded to have successfully assailed — the sexton oP 
Yarmouth, who attributed his bankruptcy “to the 
great falling off in his business consequent upon the 
scarcity of doctors? ” — The Globe. 
A New York taxidermist has a cemetery on Long 
Island in which he buries the dead pets of New 
York society people who do not care to have them 
stuffed. His little cemetery contains several hun- 
dred graves, for which his usual charge is $15. 
