The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1879-11-12
The Old National Pike.

The traffic seems like a frieze with an
indless procession OF figures. There
were sometimes sixteen gaily painted
coaches each way a day: the cattle and
sheep were never out of sight; the can
vas-covered wagons were drawn by six
or twelve horses with bows of bells
over their collars; the families of states
men and merchants went by in private
vehicles; and while most of the travel.
ers were unostentatious, a few had
splendid equipages, and employed out
riders. Some O fthe passes through the
Alleghanies were as precipitous as any
in the Sierra Nevada, and the mountains
were as wild. Within a mile Of the road
the country was a wilderness, but on the
highway the traffic was as dense and as
continuous as in the main street OF o
large town.
The national road proper was built
from Cumberland, Maryland, to Wheel
ing, Virginia, by the United States
government. the intention being to es-
tablish it as far as St.. Louis. It was
excellently macadamized; the rivers
and creeks were SPAWNED by stone
bridges; the distances were indexed by.
iron mile-posts, and the toll-houses sup
piled with strong iron gates. Its pro-
iector and chief supporter was Henry
Clay, whose services in its behalf are
'commemorated by a monument near
Wheeling. Henry Beeson, q former
Congressman, was also a. advocate of
it, and on one occasion he made a pub
lie speech in which he showed the au-
dience-so flexible is arithmetic COM
bined with imagination-that from the
number of horseshoes it would necessi-
tate, and the number of nails, it was
better adapted to promote trade than
any railroad could be. From Cumber-
and to Baltimore the road, or a large
part of it, was built by certain banks of
Maryland, which were rechartered in
1916 on condition that they should COM
plete the work. So far from being a
burden to them, it proved to be a most
lucrative property for many years,
yielding as much as twenty tper cent,
and it is only of late years that it has
Welded no more than two or three per
cent. The part built by the Federal
government was transferred to Mary
land some time ago, and the tolls be-
came a political perquisite; but within
the past year it has been acquired by
the counties of Allegheny and Garrett,
which have made it free.
We have written of what is past. The
canal and the railway have superseded
the old national "pike," and it is not
often now that a traveller disturbs the
dust that lies upon it. The dust itself, in
deed, has settled and given root to the
grass and shrubbery, which in many
places show how complete the deca-
dence is. The black snakes, m%occasins,
and copperheads, that were always plcn-
tiful in the mountains, have become so
unused to the intrusion of man that they
sun themselves in the road, and a We
hicle cannot pass without running over
them. Many of the villages which
were prosperous in the, coaching days
have fallen asleep, and the wagon of a
peddler or farmer is alone seen where
once travel was enormous. The men
who were actively engaged on the road
as drivers, station agents, and mail con-
tractors are nearly all dead The few
that remain are very old, and while an
inquiry about the past teammates them
for q moment. they soon lapse into the
oblivion of their years. But the Jaw
ems, with their hospitable and .pictur-
esque fronts, the old smithies, and the
toll-gates. have not been entirely swept
away. Enough has been left unde-
spoiled to sustain the interest and in
dividuality of the highway, which from
Frederick to Cumberland is rich by
dover of nature. independently Of its
past.-Harper's Magazine.