The Cecil Whig. [volume] (Elkton, Md.) 1841-current, 1898-07-16

Cecil. In the earliest times of the colony
there were OF course no roads few
Indian paths and bridle-ways led through
the forests. The first road Of any length
was made about the year 1872. 1t was %
miles long, and led from Augustine Her
mems manor plantation to the residence OF
his sons on the Delaware river. It's con-
structon was work of no small magni-
tude for that time, aud in commemoration
of HeTmen it was long called the 'Old
Mans PATH and yet, even before this
period a canal to connect the waters of the
Delaware and Chesapeake was talked Of
Indeed, not land-ways hut WATERWAYS
were, from the nature of their country
uppermost in the MarylandeIs' minds a
boat, not wheeled carriage, being their
handiest means of transit As more roads
were cut through the woods or traced out
over the open land, regular ferries were
established where rivers intersected them,
and al the increasing number of travellers
grew to be burden ON the hospitality OF
the planters, many of the latter, even those
of considerable social rank, kept licensed
ordnaries to supply the wants Of the
strangers. At length came bridges,
straighter il not smoother roads, mail
coaches, and at last steam boats and rail-
ways.
Grist mills were early estabIIs led, but
cloth factories failed at first because Of
the spinning wheel and hand loom busy in
every homestead of the land. This custom
indicates people industrious and clever at
domestic handicraft. Cannon were made,
and muskets from lock- stock and barrel
during the times of the revolution and the
war of 1872. AS to the manufacture of
gunpowder the chronicle is silent, and SO
is the powd + of those days, but not so is
that of the present booming and echoing
in blast after blast from the quarries of the
Susquehanna, and creating in the breast of
the unwarily approaching one, Innocent OF
the art Of making granite volatile,
trembling wonder and surprise at the way
stones fly about without wings.
But constructive skill did not confne
itself to destructive imp enltnts. FORCES
and foundries turned out agricultural TOOLS
clocks were made surveyors compassts
mathematical and other scientific instru-
employed by the various religious St cts in
building churches and meeting houses
while the civil authorities tuok care that
court houses and jails should not he for
gotten continuing for time that good
old English custom of quartering the
dead bodies of felons, but with the wide
difference of gibbeting the dismem bered
parts on opposite sides of rivers. Proyis-
ion was made by the Provincial Legisla
ture for free schools; but not being popular
they were entirely superseded by private
or subscription schools Notable among
the latter, established by the Presby terians,
are the old school Of the Rev. MI Finley
in which DIR. B'nj .min Rush received his
early education, and it's successor the pres
ent West Nottingham Academy. Amoug
the principals of the academy, the writer
remembers with fee lings of respectful re-
gard the Rev. George Burrowes, ID. ID. a
gentleman of learning and culture DR..
Buuowes presided over the academy for
ten years; subsequently he was Vice. Presi-
dent of Lafayette College. Pennsylvania,
ultimately he was sent to California, where
he labored faithfully and with success i'll
the field of education and religion.
=. S. p. CONNER.
TO BE CONTINUED