Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1906-02-23

most intolerable wrong we have to en-
dure. Something has got to be done,
and that soon, to relieve us. l hope and
you hope that this something" may be
in the form of orderly laws but if that
relief is not found then the incapables
who with power to enact sufficient law
refuse or fail to do so will be held finally
responsible for the disorderly and per-
haps violent measures which surely will
be resorted to by an outraged, abused,
endangered public.
Heaven protect us of these quiet, rural
districts, from scenes of riot and lynch
law, but, while sincerely uttering that
prayer, it is not to be forgotten that
legislatures and courts can remove all
danger of such an outcome, and that
heaven is not apt to help those too care
less or too reckless to help themselves.
Night before last on the main State
road crossing the mountain ridge which
divides New York from Massachusetts, a
neighbor of mine was met after night
fall in a lonely part of the descent by an
automobile, his horse frightened into
madness by the monsters binding head
lights and roaring engines, himself
thrown out and badly hurt. his vehicle
and harness wrecked, and he left there
by the creatures driving the automobile,
to be found by some chance passer or
not, as luck should determine.
There is hardly mile of public high
way within my knowledge which has not
been the scene of some accident, more or
less serious. due to these devil wagons"
No man hereabouts stopping for even
five minutes at a farm house cares to
leave his horse, tied or united, by the
roadside. He must drive into the barn
or to some other place hidden from the
sight and sound of these locomotives. one
of which is likely to pass at any moment
From the first settling of the roads i'm
spring till snow flies in the fall or winter
1 and most Of my neighbors keep our
road gates wide open to afford possible
refuge to women driving past in case
they should see an automobile approach
ing in time to take advantage of the
chance to turn in. | have had three
different parties of women and children
in my lane at one time of a pleasant
Sunday afternoon waiting for a trio of
the snorting, whizzing, dust-enveloped
horse scarers to pass. Two of the parties
when the danger had beloved its wav
out of sight in the distance, turned
homeward, relinquishing any further
attempt at driving from the fear that
they might meet similar danger without
similar harbor of escape within reach.
Now we farmers have to use the high
ways in our business We have to use
horses on them in our business. Some
horses are not afraid of automobiles
when the automobiles are driven slowly
by daylight without overmuch snorting
and roaring. But no horse lives that
is of any use either on the road or be-
hind pillow which is not afraid of the
things when they come roaring at him
at the rate of 80 or 40 miles an hour,
and especially after nightfall, when with
binding headlights angrily afame,
swerving, jumping plunging through
the darkness, they swoop upon him, as
inexplicable, as frightful, as terror-in-
spring to him as if they were veritable
demons from the internal regions sent
especially to devour him
And the thing is fast reaching lust
this point that we farmers must give
up using the highways either for our
pleasure or in our business or that the
automobilist must be forbidden using
them solely for their pleasure. That is
the condition which confronts us. and
no amount of theorizing as to a possible
modus vivendi which might be evolved
to meet other conditions is of the slight
est practical interest
sooner or later in the country it must
come to this-that the automobiles shall
be driven from the highways or that
the horse using residents shall be driven
from the highways.
There is only one possible solution to
this dilemma-the highways are for
the use of the majority, not for the
pleasure of the minority.
If the automobiles wish to drive their
engines over the land for the pleasure
of themselves and their friends, let them
be required to drive them as other loco
motives are driven, over their own rights
OF way, on their own roads. Let them
buy their own rights of way, and grade
them, and fence them to suit themselves.
just as railroad buys its right of way
and builds its own roadbed, let them
have the right and the power to exclude
all others from using their roads. lust
as railroad has the right and the
power to keep teams and pedestrians off
Its track, but forbid them the right to
use the highways made and built for
horses, Just as a railroad company is
forbidden the right to use the highways
OF the country for its tracks and trains. |
They are no more rightful users of the |
country roads then freight or express
trains. They are source of as real |
danger to the righlful users of those
roads as freight or express trains.-A. p. |
Hitchcock.