ROADS. [From Macaulay's History.]

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VI, Issue 450, 24 November 1849, Page 4

ROADS. [From Macaulay's History.]

The chief cause which made the fusion of the different elements of society so imperfect, was the extreme difficulty which our ancestors found in passing from place to place. Of all inventions, the alphabet and the printingpress alone excepted, those inventions which abridge distance have done most for the civilisation of our species. Every improvement of the .means of locomotion benefits mankind,

morally and intellectually, as well as materially, and not only facilitates this interchange of the various productions of nature and art, but tends to remove national and provincial antipathies, and to bind together all the branches of the great human family. In the seventeenth century, the inhabitants of London were, for almost every practical purpose further from Reading than they now are from Edinburgh, and further from Edinburgh than they now are from Vienna. The subjects of Charles the Second were not, it is true, quite unacquainted with that principle, which has in our own time produced an unprecedented revolution in human affairs, which has enabled navies to advance in the face of wind and tide, and battalions attended by all their baggage and artillery, to traverse kingdoms at a pace equal to that of the fleetest racehorse. The Marquis of Worcester had recently observed the expansive power of moisture rarefied by heat. After many experiments he had succeeded in constructing a rude steam-engine, which he called a fire water work, and which he pronounced to be an admirable aud most forcible instrument of propulsion. But the Marquis was suspected to be a madman, and known to be a Papist. His inventions, therefore, found no favourable reception. His fire water work might perhaps furnish matter for conversation at a meeting of the Royal Society, but was not applied to any practical purpose. There were no railways except a few made of timber, from the mouths of the Northumbrian coal pits to the banks of the Tyne. There was very little internal communica.ion by water. A few attempts bad been made to deepen and embank the natural streams, but with slender success. Hardly a single navigable canal had been even projected. The English of that day were in the habit of talking with mingled admiration and despair of the immense trench by which Louis the Fourteenth had made a junction between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean. They little thought that their country would, in the course of a few generations, be intersected at the cost of private adventurers by artificial rivers, making up more than four times the length of the Thames, the Severn, and the Trent together. It was by the highways that both travellers and goods generally passed from place to place, and those highways appear to have been excepted from the degree of wealth and civilization which the nation had even then attained. On the best lines of communication the ruts were deep, the descents precipitous, and the way often such as it was hardly possible to distinguish in the dusk, from the unenclosed heath and fen, whch lay on both sides. Ralph Thoresby, the antiquary, was in danger of losing his wav on the great north road, between Barnaby Moor and Tuxford, and actually lost his way between Doncaster and York. Pepys and his wife, travelling in their own coach, lost their way between Newbury and Reading. In the.course of the same tour, they lost their way near Salisbury, and were in danger of having to pass, the night on the plain. It was only in fine weather that the whole breadth of the road was available for wheeled vehicles. Often the mud lay deep on the right and on the left, and only a narrow track of firm ground rose above the quagmire. At such times obstructions and quarrels were frequent, and the path was sometimes blocked up during a long time by carriers, neither of whom would break the way. It happened almost every day that coaches stuck fast, until a team of cattle could be procured from some neighbouring farm, to tug them out of the slough ; but in bad weather the traveller had to encounter inconveniences still more serioui. Thoresby, who was in the habit of travelling between Leeds and the capital, has recorded in his diary such a series of perils and disasters as might suffice for a journey to the frozen ocean, or to the desert of Sahara. On one occasion he learned that the floods were out between Ware and London, that passengers bad to swim for their lives, and that a higgler had perished in the attempt to cross. In consequence of these tidings he turned out of the high road, and was conducted across some meadows, were it was necessary for him to ride to the saddle skirts in water. In the course of another journey he narrowly escaped being swept away by an inundation of the Trent. He was afterwards detained at Stamford four days, on account of the state of the roads and then ventured to proceed only, because fourteen members of the House of Commons, who were going up in a body to Parliament, with guides and numerous attendants, took him into their company. On the roads of Derbyshire, travellers were in constant fear of their necks, and were frequently compelled to alight, and lead their beasts. The great route through Wales to Holyhead was in such a state, that, in 1685, a viceroy, going to Ireland, was five hours in travelling fourteen miles from St. Asaph to Conway. Between Conway »nd Beaumaris, he was forced to walk great part of the way, and his lady was carried in 9 litter. His

coach was with difficulty, and by the help of many hands, brought after him entire. In general carriages were taken to pieces at Conway, and borne on the shoulders of stout Welsh peasants to the Menai Straits. In somt parts of Kent and Sussex, none but the strongest horses could in winter get through tbe bog, in which at every step they sank deep. The markets were often inaccessible during several months. It is said that the fruits of the earth were sometimes suffered to rot in one place, while in another place, distant only a few miles, the supply fell far short of the demand. The wheeled carriages were in this district generalls pulled by oxen. Wheu Prince George of Denmark visited the stately mansion of Petworth in wet weather, he was six hours in going nine miles, and it was necessary that a body of sturdy hinds should bo on each, side of his coach in order to prep it. Of the carriages which conveyed bis retinue, several were upset and injured. A letter from one of his gentlemen in waiting has been preserved, in which the unfortunate courtier complains that during fourteen hours he never once alighted, except when his coach was overturned or stuck fast in the mud. One chief cause of the badness of the roads seems to have been the defective state of the law. Every parish was bound to repair the highway which passed through it. The pea* santry were forced to give their gratuitous la* bour six days in the year. If this was not sufficient, hired labour was employed, and the expense was met by a parochial rate. That a route connecting two great towns, which have a large and thriving trade with each other, should be maintained at the cost of this rural population scattered between them is absolutely unjust ; and this injustice was peculiarly glaring in the case of the great North Road, which traversed very poor and thinly inhabited districts, and joined very rich and populous districts. Indeed it was not in the powei of the parishes of Huntingdonshire to mend a highway worn by the passing and repassing of traffic between the West Riding of Yorkshire and London. Soon after the Restoration this grievance attracted the notice of Parliament ; and an act, the first of our many turnpike acts, was passed, imposing a small toll on travellers and goods, for the purpose of keeping some parts of this important line in good repair. This innovation, however, excited many murmurs, and the other great avenues to the capita] were long left under the old system. A change was at length effected, but not without great difficulty, for unjust and absurd taxation to which, men are accustomed is often borne far more willingly than the most reasonable impost which is new. It was not till many toll-bars had been violently pulled down, till troops had in many districts been forced to act against the people, and till much blood had been shed, that a good system was introduced. By slow degrees reason triumphed over prejudice, and our island is now crossed in every direction by near thirty thousand miles of turnpike road. On the best highways heavy articles were in the time of Charles the Second generally conveyed from place to place by stage waggons. In the straw of these vehicles nestled a crowd of passengers, who could not afford to travel by coach or on horseback, and who were prevented by infirmity or the weight of their luggage from going on foot. The expense of transmitting heavy goods in this way was enormous. Prom London to Birmingham the charga was seven pounds a ton ; from London to Exeter twelve pounds a ton. This was about fifteen pence a ton for every mile ; more by a third than was afterwards charged on turnpike roads, and fifteen times what is now demanded by railway companies. This cost of conveyance amounted to a prohibition tax on many useful articles. Coal id particular was never seen except in the dis«. tricts where it was produced, or in the districts to which it could be carried by sea, and was indeed always known in the South of England by the name of sea coal. On by-roads, and generally throughout thd country north of York and west of Exeter, goods were carried by long trains of'packhorses. These strong and patient beasts, the breed of which is now extinct, were attended by a class of men, who seem to have boms much resemblance to the Spanish muleteer. A traveller of humble condition often found it convenient to perform a journey mounted on a pack-saddle between two baskets under the care of these hardy guides. The expense of this mode of conveyance was small ; but the caravan moved at a' foot's pace, and in winter the cold was often insupportable.