The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1871-04-08
The Lecture of "Grace Greenwood"


1.-The Heroic in Common Life, ON Mon
day night, which closed the series of lee
lures for the season, was one OF the best
and we think the very best of the course.
The lady has certainly the art of expression
to a remarkable degree of perfection, know
ing exactly where to stop, when she has
made point. Nothing can exceed the
beauty and pathos of her tender passages.
Grace Greenwood's lectures are not de-
signed merely to please and tickle the
fancy of the audience for the moment: but
are sermons, and those who listen to them
90 away wiser, resolved to act their parts
in life more nobly, more heroicly in the
future. All honor to Grace Greenwood.
A type of the noble, pure hearted woman.
She is evidently a strong advocate of
matrimony-but for that matter, what
woman is not-and never fails to leave
with her audience, one or two pictures of
her matchless sketching of the beauty and
joy of maternal life. On Monday evening,
after depicting the fame of a celebrated
female sculptor, who can produce her
ideal of beauty in the cold but peerless
marble, she drew the contrast between the
image wrought out of the frigid stone, and
the real in flesh and blood, with fiaxen
hair, round, smooth limbs, and rosy cheeks.
contemplated by the mother, as her
chubby, sleeping child lays cuddled in its
crib. Grace thought there was more solid
renown in originating such form of real
beauty, than any venus of stone ever fash
toned by the chisel of genius. We don't
know but the gifted lecturer was correct;
and it must be a great satisfaction to every
woman to know that she is born artist
with fair prospect of achieving imperish-
able honors.
Road Mending.-A correspondent in to-
days Wig gives some sensible suggestions
on repairing and keeping in proper order
the county roads. Supervisors should pom
der well the hints he throws out, and try
the experiment.
The hill rising from the bridge at Sites
Mill, to the forks of the North East and
Nottingham roads, for the want of ditch,
has been an abominable mud-hole for years.
A very trihing sum would pay for ditching
it, and making it dry, solid road for all
future time. And miles and miles of road
might be made dry and firm, at all seasons
by the same means.
At this season of the year, roads, where
much heavy teaming is done, are cut into
deep ruts while they are soft and muddy,
and when the warm sun and winds dry
them up, they remain in shocking condi-
ton; full Of deep ruts and gullies, till
worn down by use, which often takes half
the Summer. In some sections of country,
as soon as the rains cease and the roads
begin to harden, the supervisor goes on
them with a machine made of two-inch
oak plank, ten or twelve feet long, with
strong iron handles fastened to the plank,
so that it can be held firmly on one edge.
A pair of horses are hitched to the machine,
in such a manner that it will draw diago-
nally, or one end in advance of the other,
the rear end being toward the middle of
the road. By passing this simple machine
over rough, rutty road, few times, the
Jumps are broken down, the wheel tracks
filled up, and all supertluous dirt forced
toward the centre of the road. An old
cross-cut saw, or plate of iron rivited to
the front of this scraper, at its lower edge,
will greatly improve its effectiveness. Two
men and pair of horses, with simple
machine like this, which any supervisor
could make, would accomplish more toward
smoothing cut-up road, after the Spring
rains have ceased, than ten men and boys
with shovels.
Some roads, during the wet seasons,
work into almost impossible bog, or mud
holes, which are an impeachment to travel
half the Summer. The only remedy for
such holes is to shovel out the soft, half
liquid mud and fill the cavity with stones,
which should be we'll broken and pounded
in, then covered slightly with gravel or
sand, if they can be had. To tilt large
unbroken stones into mud-hole is gener-
ally to render the evil worse. The smooth
stone slip about, the mud serving as lubri-
Gator, and the wheels of heavy wagons
soon find the bottom. Stones, to make the
bed of road solid, must be broken the
rough edges then adhere and prevent them
from being displaced by wheels.