Our Country Roads

The Lansing Republican in an nrticle upon the wagon roads of the Grand River valley, has these sensible ideas : "The very bost roads in the world are nado of cruslied stone. With a stouecrusher and a portable eight or ten horse lower engine, either rock f rom the bed )f the river and Itt tributary st reama, or oosc boulders pieked up anvwhere, can je crushed so as to pass through tho twonch uieshes of a sleve as rapidly as several men can feed the stones into the hopier. 8uch finely cruslied stone thrown iown two or tlnee inches thiek on a road jed of clay, or dressed with n inch or ;vo of clay on top where it is sandy, nakes the inuguificeiit and water-tight, sinooth-as-a-floor stone roads of Canada and some parts of the Tnircd States - roads that are liria as rock in kkfl very worst seasona of the year, that are tiwayi clean, and that are as valuable to farmers as railroads. In the Grand River valley sucli roads could be conatructcd cheapl3', Once made, road taxes would thereai'ter substantially cease, as Uie repairsjwhich consistiu annually throwing down a little cruslied stone in worn spots, eosts al most nothing. "Next to stone roads are gravel roads. These can be constructed uil tlnouh the Grand River valley clieaply. In some places they can be mide very much :heaper than stone roads; bnt their aiinual expense for repairs is larger ; and unless skillfully made there are times of the yearwhen they are not lirin. At any time the best gravel road is only schond best. Bilt the Grand River valley bM only a lew short stretches of these. lts people have been paying and working road taxes these last 30 to 00 years, and llave to show for their nioney and work roads that the poorest new settlements of some parts of Canada would bo Hglinined Uf, Many dollars' loss has beeu sntleicil by eacli farmer living on these poor roads in the course of all these years throügh not being able to go to market at the season of the year when the prices were the highest and when he conldn't do nny thing else. And yet how many are still willing to go on in the sanie oíd wasteful and loging way, through never having been waked up on this subject. A goou stone road would on the average nbout doublé the saleable value of every acre of land past which it should run."