The Cape Girardeau Democrat. (Cape Girardeau, Mo.) 1876-1909, 1896-12-26

PfttsbuSSh Paper Says They Are Employed
in the Making OF Roads.

in the Making OF Roads.
Now that the farmer cannot get
enough for much of his products to
pay cost of hauling to market, it is
perhaps pertinent TO remind him again
that much of the cost of5transportation
can be reduced by 4 sensible repair of
the roads. An immense amount of ele-
mentary knowledge on the subject has
been evolved, enough to make the head
swim, and we have been told enough
about gradients. etc. to make some peo-
pie think that highways cannot be i'm
proved, except under the direction OF
kigh-priced engineers, payment OF
whose services will eat up much of the
tax levied by the county. The present
generation will see comparatively lit
tie accomplished under the general law,
unless it is supplemented by q liberal
infusion of gumption furnished by tax
payers at large in the rural districts.
The townships in this county have
levied for many years past from fourto
ten times the amount of road tax levied
by the county commissioners this year,
and in most cases it has been a useless
expenditure.
A little mixture of arithmetic and
ommon sense will suffice n supervisor
in making a grade. The Appian way is
one of the b~est-graded roads in the
world, and it antedates the Christian
era, reaching back to & time when en-
cheering, as a science, was scarcely
known.
But more important than grades at
present is the manner of making road
teds. ANY farmer knows that clay land,
when packed by hauling heavy loads
over it for Il time. becomes so firm that
ordinary wheeling over it has little Ell.
feet to cut, even in quite wet weather,
if the water is not allowed to stand it,
consequently the average country road
can lie kept in fairly good condition if
thoroughly drained Oh both sides and
kept high in the middle. Any observant
person can verify the assertion by drIF-
ing 4 dozen miles from Pittsburgh in
any direction. Whenever he strikes a
w~eIl-drained piece of dirt road he will
find it in good order, unless unusually
heavy burdens are drawn over it. But
in many places he will fail to find any
drain, except, perhaps, in the middle
of the road, where floods have been al
lowed 10 make their own channel.
The second measure suggested by
common sense is the clearing of the
roads of all stones, unless enough are
Put en- to thoroughly macadamize. The
prevalent practice is when Il mud hole
has been worn in Il road to fill it with
stones. and they are not usually broker
line, either. The result is that after
the next wet spell following the filling
there will be two mud holes instead OF
60 on each side of the first.
Even q stone but four inches in diam
eter allowed to lie on n road has often
been the cause of Il disagreeable mud
hole. The average supervisor patches
these holes in the objectionable way
mentioned, puts in an occasional cUi-
vert, and then finds his appropriation
exhausted. Frequently it does not
amount to more than 500 n mile, but
with the strong road plows now in use
much draining might be done even Oh
this scant appropriation. Collier town
ship last year successfully used Il trac-
ton engine to pull the read plow. Al
though millions of dollars have been
spent patching the township reads in
this county, they are not in as good
condition to-day as they were in 1856.
In road-making there can be found
profitable use for many free dollars,
but the present system of highway
management belongs to the seven
teenth century, and, in addition to be-
ing enormously wasteful, is almost use
lesS.-Pittsburgh Post.