BEFORE EFORE the days of Semiramis, whose highways are among the first mentioned in history, or the times when Roman way-wrights constructed thoroughfares as durable as their language, or Onund of Norway earned his title of 'road-maker,' or Macadam proved the virtue of broken granite, mankind could not have failed to perceive that in proportion to the smoothness and levelness of the ground over which they journeyed, so was the speed, ease, and comfort of travelling. Make the paths straight,' must have been a precept of peculiar significance in an age when paths were the only routes; and we can easily imagine that the maker of a road would be regarded with not less of reverent gratitude than he who ' digged a well.' Such insight as we get into remote antiquity shews us that the earliest nations-in the 'far east,' and in the countries bordering the Mediterranean-had mastered the rudiments of road-making, and shaped them into a completeness not far removed from science. The Romans, borrowing the idea of paved roads from the Carthaginians, set to work with that practical common sense which characterised them, and constructed roads from their capital city to every quarter of their mighty empire. With them a chief point was to have the roads straight and level; they understood too well the importance and advantage of facile means of transit and communication, and with singular skill and boldness they pierced or excavated hills, built bridges and viaducts, and raised embankments, remarkable alike for their extent and their durability. In Italy alone there were several thousand miles of public highways; of these the 'Queen of Roads,' or Appian Way,' 142 miles in length, is the most noteworthy. It was constructed by Appius Claudius 310 years before the birth No. 89. VOL. XII. 1 of Christ; and Procopius, writing in the sixth century, says of it:—' To traverse the Appian Way is a distance of five days' journey for a good walker, and it leads from Rome to Capua; its breadth is such that two chariots may meet upon it and pass each other without interruption; and its magnificence surpasses that of all other roads. For constructing this great work, Appius caused the materials to be fetched from a great distance, so as to have all the stones hard and of the nature of millstones, such as are not to be found in this part of the country. Having ordered this material to be smoothed and polished, the stones were cut in corresponding angles, so as to fit together in joinings without the intervention of copper or any other material to bind them, and in this manner they were so firmly united, that in looking at them one would say they had not been put together by art, but had grown so upon the spot; and notwithstanding the wear of so many ages-being traversed daily by a multitude of vehicles and all sorts of cattle -they still remain unmoved; nor can the least trace of ruin or waste be observed upon these stones, neither do they appear to have lost any of their beautiful polish; and such is the Appian Way.' Much of this description remains true even at the present day; and the road, after the lapse of more than 2000 years, still presents an instructive model to the modern artificer. With the exception of the Roman highways, the public thoroughfares in England scarcely deserved the name of roads. During the period of Saxon rule, and down to the Stuarts, they were mere tracks across the country, patched with rude paving in the softer places, and 'very noisome and tedious to travel in, and dangerous to all passengers and carriages,' as declared in the act imposing 'statute labour' for the repair of the highways in the reign of Mary. The labour when performed was capricious, not systematic people mended such portions as traversed their farms or estates, and left the rest to take care of itself. The first attempts at real improvement may be considered as dating from the passing of the first turnpike act in 1653, of which the preamble stated that parts of the great north road leading to York and Scotland were 'very ruinous and become almost impassable, insomuch that it is become very dangerous to all his majesty's liege people that pass that way.' In the reign of Charles II. the taking of tolls was first established on a turnpikeroad leading from Hertfordshire to the counties of Huntingdon and Cambridge. So slow, however, was the progress of improvement, that the roads throughout the country were but little changed for the better during the next hundred years; many became worse, and some which had been wide were narrowed by encroachments and neglect. According to Stow, wagons were in use on some roads for the conveyance of goods and passengers as early as 1541; but the most of the traffic was carried on by means of packhorses, which, tethered together in long trains, made their way slowly and painfully along the causeways, and whoever met them was obliged to step off into the mire on either side to get out of their way. The people of Kendal,' says Roger North, writing in 1676, could write to most trading towns and have answers by the packs-for all is horse-carriage-with returns-time being allowed-as certain as by the post.' In 1609 to send a letter from York to Oxford, and get back an answer, took a whole month, and even after the establishment of the post in 1660 correspondence was 6 |