But although this turnpike system has conduced to make many new roads, and to change many old ones into what may be called good roads, in comparison with what they formerly were, this system has been carried into execution under such erroneous rules, and the persons who have been intrusted with the administration of them have uniformly been either so negligent, or so little acquainted with the business of making or repairing roads, that at this moment it may be stated, with the utmost correctness, that there is not one in England, except those recently made by some eminent civil engineers, which is not extremely defective in its most essential qualities.*

With regard to the lines of direction of the turnpike roads, they evidently have not been laid out according to any fixed principle; they are, in fact, almost in every instance, precisely the identical lines, which formed the footpaths of the aboriginal inhabitants of the country.

The following passage is taken from a pamphlet, called "The Landed Property of England:". "Most of the old roads of the kingdom (the remains of the Roman ways excepted) owe their present lines to particular circumstances. Many

• Mr. Edgeworth says, in his Essay on the Construction of Roads, published in 1813, "Since this Essay was written, I have visited England, and have found, on a journey of many hundred miles, scarcely twenty of well-made road. In many parts of the country, and especially near London, the roads are in a shameful condition; and the pavement of London is utterly unworthy of a great metropolis." Introduction, p. 7.

of them were, no doubt, originally footpaths; some of them, perhaps, the tracks of the aboriginal inhabitants, and these footpaths became, as the condition of society advanced, the most convenient horsepaths. According as the lands of the kingdom were appropriated, the tortuous lines of road became fixed and unalterable, there being no other legal lines left for carriage roads, and hence the origin of the crookedness and steepness of existing roads."

As many other great defects exist in all the principal roads, it is to be hoped, that at length the attention of the public and of government will be roused, and seriously and effectually engaged in bringing about a proper remedy. These defects are, in point of fact, so numerous' and so glaring, that it is quite evident that the true principles of the art of road-making have not yet been followed. The breadth of a road is seldom defined to a regular number of feet by straight and regular boundaries, such as fences, footpaths, mounds of earth, or side channels. The transverse section of the surface, when accurately ascertained by taking the levels of it, is rarely to be found of a regular convexity. The surface of all the roads, until within a few years, was every where cut into deep ruts, and even now, since more attention has been paid to them, though the surface is smoother, the bed of materials which forms it is universally so thin, that it is weak, and consequently exceedingly imperfect. Drainage is neglected; high hedges and

trees are allowed to intercept the action of the sun and wind in drying the surface roads; and many roads, by constantly carrying off the mud from them for a number of years, have been sunk below the level of the adjoining fields, so that they are always wet and damp, and owing to the rapid decay of the materials which are laid upon them, can be kept in order but at a great expense.

The business of road-making in this country has been confined almost entirely to the management of individuals wholly ignorant of the scientific principles on which it depends. It has received, till very lately, little attention from the scientific world; so little, indeed, that the primary and indispensable objects of providing a dry and sound foundation for the surface materials, and of giving the surface a regular convexity, have not, till within a short time, been recognized or explained by any scientific rules whatever. Although various select committees of the House of Commons have been appointed to take into consideration the state and condition of the roads, it does not, however, appear that any system for forming them on scientific principles has been suggested by them. On the contrary, the approbation expressed in their reports of the doctrines of a modern publication as comprising a perfect system of road-making, shows that they were not qualified for this task: for nothing, in point of fact, can be more opposed to the principles of science with respect to moving bodies, such as carriages, on roads, than what is recom

mended in that work as the perfection of roadmaking.*

In point of fact, there has not been any book in the English Language that treats of the science and art, or, in other words, of those facts and those rules of civil engineering which are applicable to the construction of roads. The various publications on this subject are none of them the works of civil engineers. The tracing of new lines, cutting through hills, and forming embankments, making the breadth every where the same, and defining it

Remarks on Road-making, by John Loudon M'Adam. Extract from the Westminster Review, Vol. iv. p. 354. "We consider this latter person's name (Mr. M'Adam) as deserving of a few remarks, for other reasons than its present popularity. The public naturally looks on him as a sort of magician, and his invention, as it is thought, as something preternatural. If his own name had not been Macadmizable into a verb, it is probable that his roads would, even yet, have been little known. He did not invent the method in question of breaking stone, because it had long been the practice of Sweden and Switzerland, and other countries, and was long known to every observing traveller.

Although what is commonly called Mr. M'Adam's system of road-making had nothing original in it, and was in all its essential points not only not according to the principles of science, but directly opposed to them, still he certainly had the merit, of no inconsiderable value, of being the first person who succeeded in persuading the trustees of turnpike roads to set seriously about the improvement of them. By teaching them how to prepare materials, and keep the surface of a road free from ruts by continually raking and scraping it, he produced a considerable change for the better in all the roads of the kingdom.

with side channels and footpaths; giving roads a regular transverse shape, so that the surface shall have an uniform convexity, and that the side boundaries shall be on the same level; and so constructing the surface as to reduce the intensity of the tractive power as much as possible, have all been wholly overlooked.

The foreign scientific traveller must be astonished to find that a nation like England, which displays such an extent of science as regards its canals, docks, bridges, and other public works, should exhibit in its roads such great imperfections. It must, in truth, be admitted that the roads of England do no credit to the wisdom of her laws respecting them, nor to the care and skill of those who have been intrusted with their management.

While, during a considerable number of years, every improvement which depended on the industrious classes made immense progress, that of roads, the management of which the laws have vested in the hands of the land proprietors, made no advancement at all until very recently.

It was only about fifteen years ago that the landed proprietors seem to have begun to comprehend the value of good roads, and to be aware that large funds, and a considerable share of science and constant attention are necessary to bring them into a perfect state.

At the present time, although the country gentlemen are somewhat more active and better in