coaches, and as long again at a distance from London. He says that his drivers represent the crossing backwards and forwards through the gravel, heaped sometimes in the middle of the roads near London, as tearing the horses' hearts out.' He further states that the Surry Road is so much improved, that he can travel sixteen miles with more facility than he could formerly travel twelve. Mr. Botham, of Speen, (who keeps more than 100 horses,) and Mr. Fromont, both bear testimony to the improvement effected by Mr. M'Adam.

We now come to Mr. M'Adam himself. Of his practical directions we shall speak presently of his qualifications for the task which he has undertaken, our readers may form some judgment from the following extracts from his evidence.

'On my first arriving from America in the year 1783, at the time the roads were making in Scotland, (their turnpike acts being in operation about twenty years at that time,) very many of their roads were made. I was then appointed a commissioner of the roads, and had occasion to see a great deal of road-work, This first led me to inquire into the general method of road-making, and the expense of it. Since that period I have been mostly in Bristol, where I was also appointed a commissioner of the roads; the very defective state of which could not fail to attract my attention. I was induced to offer myself to the commissioners to take charge of the roads as a surveyer; because I found it impossible for any individual commissioner to get the roads put into a situation of being mended with any prospect of success; and no individual could incur the expense of making experiments on a great scale. The roads of Bristol were accordingly put under my direction in the month of January, 1816.

I have travelled various times during the last twenty years, to ascertain which are the best roads, and which the best means of roadmaking, over the whole kingdom, from Inverness in Scotland to Land's End in Cornwall. I have obtained all the information that an unauthorised person could expect to receive. More pains and much more expense have been bestowed on the roads of late years, but without, in my opinion, producing any adequate effect, from want of skill in the executive department. I consider the roads in South Wales, in Monmouthshire, in Cornwall, in Devonshire, in Herefordshire, in part of Hampshire, in part of Oxfordshire, and some part of Gloucestershire, as managed with the least skill, and consequently, at the heaviest expense.'- You asked me with respect to the spirit of improvement; I would wish to explain in what way I think that is proceeding. I have been sent for, and consulted by thirty-four different sets of commissioners, and as many different trusts, and thirteen counties to the extent of 637 miles, all of whom have been making improvements, and I have had many subsurveyors instructed and sent to distant parts of the country.

The repairs of 148 miles round Bristol, and many expensive perma

nent

nent improvements and alterations have been made in the last three years, during which a floating debt of upwards 1400l. has been paid off, a considerable reduction of the principal debt has been made, and a balance of 2790l. Os. 4d. is remaining in the hands of the treasurer. The Bristol district has been under one trust for twenty years, and in that period the debt has increased to 43,000.'-pp. 18, 19.

In a subsequent part of his evidence, he states that, by improved management, the Epsom trust has been enabled to lower the toll on agricultural carriages; and that the road between Reading and Twyford has been made smooth and solid at an expense, including the Surveyor's salary, not exceeding fifteen pounds per week; while their former expenditure, exclusive of the Surveyor's salary, was twenty-two pounds per week. Mr. M'Adam estimates the yearly toll revenue at a million and a quarter from the circumstance of there being 25,000 miles of turnpike roads in England and Wales; and reminds us that the Committee of 1811 estimated the saving which would be made to the country by putting the roads in a proper state of repair, at five millions annually.

Mr. James M'Adam, who has been instructed by his father, mentions some flagrant instances of abuse in the appointment of surveyors. In one instance he found as surveyor, with 60l. per annum, a person who had been an underwriter at Lloyd's Coffee House; in another a bed-ridden old man, who employed to execute his office a carpenter to whom the commissioners allowed 20l. per annum; in another there were three surveyors, one a cripple, another a carpenter, and the third a coal merchant. To shew in how great a degree his father's system is carried into effect by manual labour, he states that at Reading during eight months, 500l. were laid out, 400l. of which were for human labour: at Cheshunt, 8007. in five months, only forty of which went for cartage: at Wadesmill, 600l.; at Royston, 500l.; and at Huntingdon 201. per week were all speut in labour.

We next have several gentlemen who, from their experience as commissioners, bear testimony to the merits of Mr. M'Adam. Mr. Cripps, after speaking of the improvements effected near Epsom and the consequent diminution of tolls, says

I had an opportunity of observing in Sweden, that the roads were more beautiful than any I ever beheld; they are formed in the same manner as by Mr. M'Adam, the materials broken extremely small. The material is the best in the world, as it is rock of granite; and so well do they understand the necessity of breaking them small, that you never behold throughout Sweden a fragment of granite larger than the size of a walnut, for the purposes of the roads.- -What is the shape of these roads? To the eye they appear perfectly flat; but upon trial

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trial by the spirit level, there is a slight degree of convexity.'-Evidence, p. 39.

The remaining evidence is that of some of the most experienced road-engineers and surveyors. From this we shall extract what we think most important to the remarks which we shall offer to our readers upon the laying out, the formation, and the maintaining of roads.

In the original laying out of roads, we are glad to find in favour of some degree of curvature, such good authority as that of Mr. Edgeworth.

To follow the mathematical axiom, that a straight line is the shortest that can be drawn between two points, will not succeed in making the most commodious roads; hills must be avoided, towns must be resorted to, and the sudden bends of rivers must be shunned.'— It may perhaps appear surprising, that there is but little difference in length between a road that has a gentle bend, and one that is in a perfectly straight line. A road two miles long and perfectly straight can scarcely be found any where; but if such a road could be found, and if it were curved so as to prevent the eye from seeing farther than a quarter of a mile of it, in any one place, the whole road would not be lengthened more than one hundred and fifty yards. It is not proposed to make serpentine roads merely for the entertainment of travellers; but it is intended to point out that a strict adherence to a straight line is of much less consequence than is usually supposed.-Edgeworth, P. 12.

We wish this observation could be impressed on those merciless annihilators of rural scenery, the Commissioners of Inclosures. We were perhaps a little disposed to smile at the following passages of Mr. Paterson, though we admit the justness both of his illustration and of his reasons.

'The difference between going over a hill, and round the bottom of it, is not, in point of distance, quite so much as is generally understood. Place, for instance, an egg upon a table: then, from the one end to the other, trace a line upon the shell exactly on the horizontal plane: between the same extreme points of the egg, trace a line over the top of it directly in the vertical plane; and the length of those two lines will be found to be exactly equal. The same observation will apply, in a greater or lesser degree, to the forming of roads over hilly ground.'There is another remark in favour of the curved line in general, which it may be proper to attend to. Every traveller knows by experience, that in going but a mile or two of a road that is formed on a straight line, the sight of such a distance before him oppresses his mind with fatigue, and he thinks it long till he arrives at the end of his prospect. Or rather, the eye of the traveller taking in such a large prospect at once, the distance appears less than it really is, as is the case in looking over an expanse of water, or an extensive plain. So that in proportion as hope is encouraged by the deceiving prospect, in like proportion

will he experience disappointment and fatigue as he becomes gradually undeceived by the real length of the road in travelling along it. But in going the same distance of a road that is diversified by several windings, his mind is diverted from the fatigue by the change of scenery that opens to his view, at every turn or winding of the road; so that while he moves along, if he is not amused, he feels it, at any rate, less tiresome than in the former case.'

Inspired, we presume, by the beautiful passage of his countryman on the tide of human time,' Mr. Paterson goes on to moralize on the journey of life: we have neither time nor taste to follow him in his ambitious but desultory course, and must therefore be contented to jog on in more sober guise.

How much may be effected by science and skill in diminishing the obstruction occasioned by hills, is exemplified in the evidence of Mr. Telford, engineer of the Holyhead road, under the parliamentary commissioners.

'On the Welsh part of that road,' he says, 'the inclinations were formerly (in many instances) as much as one in six, seven, eight, nine and ten; the width at the same time frequently not exceeding twelve feet, without protection on the lower side.' Now the longitudinal inclinations are in general less than one in thirty; in one instance for a considerable distance there was no avoiding one in twentytwo, and in another for about two hundred yards, one in seventeen; but in these two cases, the surface of the roadway being made peculiarly smooth and hard, no inconvenience is experienced by wheel carriages.'

In the formation of roads, one of the most prevailing faults is that of giving them too great a convexity: a fall of three inches, Mr. M'Adam says, from the centre to the side, is sufficient for a road thirty feet wide. The inefficacy of the convexity for the purpose of draining the roads is pointed out by Mr. Edgeworth.

In all these schemes for carrying off water from the roads by the inclination of the ground it seems to have escaped the attention of those who proposed them, that no lateral inclination of the ground, consistent with the safety of carriages, would empty a rut of three inches deep. So far from this being the case, whoever attends to the fact will find, that even down a moderate slope, where any dirt remains upon the roads, the water will be obstructed.'-' In fact,' he continues, roads become dry by evaporation; and where they are exposed to sun and wind, the effects of heat and ventilation are more powerful than any surface drainage that could be accomplished.'-p. 14.

All the materials, of which the surface of the road is formed, should be broken small. The reason for this is thus given by Mr. M'Adam.

'It seems an obvious proposition, that the materials of which a road is to be composed, should be reduced to such a size as shall enable carriages to pass over without striking against them, so that they may be consolidated

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consolidated by a perpendicular pressure. The size of the stones must be proportioned to that part of the wheel, which will form the point of contact upon a smooth level surface; and this will be found to be about an inch square. When the stones of a road exceed the size of this bearing, the wheels of carriages will keep them in constant motion, and prevent their consolidating, because when a wheel rests only on one part of a stone, the other part rises; or if the stone be so large that the wheel does not pass over, but strikes against it, besides the impediment presented to the carriage, a great damage is done to the road. From this it appears that every stone above a specified size is a positive disadvantage in road-making. Upon a road made of wellordered materials, wheel carriages will pass over without any jolt or shake; and consequently without that action and re-action between the wheels and the stones, which is the real cause of the present bad state of the roads of Great Britain. A rough road can only be a road made of large stones; and as neither use nor change of weather can produce them, the defect must be entirely the work of the road-maker.'—Mem. p. 5.

Mr. Edgeworth agrees with him. (p. 20.) 'No stones larger than an inch and a half diameter should be suffered to remain on the road; when much inaccuracy in this respect is suspected, an iron ring may be employed as a gauge.' Mr. Paterson recommends a ring of a diameter of two inches, or two inches and a half. Mr. M'Adam has the stones broken to the weight of six ounces.

• Do you find a measure or ring through which the stones will pass a good method of regulating their size?-That is a very good way; but I always make my surveyors carry a pair of scales, and a six ounce weight in their pockets, and when they come to a heap of stones, they weigh one or two of the largest, and if they are reasonably about that weight they will do; it is impossible to make them come exactly to it.' -Report, p. 24.

In breaking stones for roads,' Mr. Edgeworth says, 'the best method is to have them broken by a person sitting, and using small hammers.-A hard stone may serve for an anvil, and the stone to be broken may be advantageously held in a forked stick.' (p. 20.) Mr. M'Adam recommends the employment of women and children in this operation, and adds that his recommendation applies to all materials universally. Round gravel and round pebbles never make a tolerable road: but broken stone will combine by its own angles into a smooth solid surface, that cannot be affected by the vicissitudes of weather.'

But though all our authorities agree in the necessity of forming the surface of the road of stone broken small, there is some discordance among them as to the foundation, especially in a swampy soil. When the substratum of a road is unsound,' says Mr. Edgeworth, (p. 18.) it should be covered with faggots of brushwood, with the branches of fir trees, or with furze and

heath.