Baring-Gould Sabine
Old Country Life
CHAPTER VIII
OLD ROADS
PRACTICAL inconvenience attends living at the junction of the Is-not and the Is. To make myself better understood, I must explain.
On October 11th, 1809, Colonel Mudge published the Ordnance Survey of the county which I grace with my presence. In that map he entered a Proposed Road, running about four miles from N. to S. through my property, and in front of my house. I was not alive at the time, so the expression "my house" is inexact, it was the house of my grandfather. This proposed road was to be a main artery of traffic, and a county road, – but it was never carried out. To carry it out would have been inconvenient, as the walled garden of the house, with very good jargonelle and Bon-chrétien pears lies athwart the proposed course, and an ancient black fig-tree that produces abundantly every year grows precisely on the site of the proposed road. I presume that my grandfather raised objections. Anyhow the road was never made. However, since the survey of 1809, map-makers – convinced that what was then proposed has been in effect carried out – have systematically entered this road as an accomplished fact.
Now perhaps the reader can understand what it is to live on the point of junction of the Is and Is-not. The road indicated on the maps is not in existence, and yet the public consider, on the authority of the maps, that it is.
Then, again, I live in another way on the Is and Is-not. In 1836 a new and excellent road – now a county road – was carried at right angles to the proposed road, leading into the old high-road about a mile and a half from my house, and connecting that old high-road with the principal market town of the district, about nine miles off. Before this was constructed, the old way ran up hill and down dale in a series of scrambles, straight as an arrow; and one stretch of this road is now utterly impassable, it is simply a water-course, and a torrent rushes down it in a series of cascades over steps of slate-rock in winter, and after rain. Now – will it be believed? – just as the maps have accepted the proposed road as if it had really been made, because it was marked by Col. Mudge, so they have all ignored this main county road, because it did not exist in the days of Col. Mudge, and they persist in giving the old road, and ignoring the new one, that makes a great sweep through valleys, and indeed describes two sides of an obtuse-angled triangle, of which the old road forms the hypothenuse.
Now the reader will understand even more clearly how it is that I live on the what is, yet is not. The road is there – rates are paid to keep it up, and yet – it is not in any map, though it has been in existence for more than half a century.
Now for the practical inconvenience. One day I saw a party of men with guns walking across my grounds, in front of my house. I knew they had been poaching, and so I rushed out after them.
"What are you about? Why are you trespassing?" I roared. One of them pulled out a map and pointed. "We are going along the Queen's highway. Double black edges mark a main road. We cannot be trespassing." I was silenced.
One day I found school-boys in my walled garden eating my Bon-chrétien pears. I ordered them off, threatening them with vengeance.
"Please, sir, we did not know we were doing wrong. On the map we saw that this was a highway, and we thought we were at liberty to take anything that grows on the road." Bad maps and over-education had robbed me of my Bon-chrétien pears.
That is the disadvantage of living on or near the site of a road that is not, but which the authorities that enlighten the minds of the ignorant assert to be. My notion is, that the Press is the great instrument for the diffusion of false information among the masses. Nothing will break that conviction in me. An acquaintance was staying at the market town, and I invited him over to dinner. He hired a trap and drove himself. He had the map, he could manage, he said. He never arrived. Trusting to the map, he had gone by the old road, and had been precipitated down the cascade. The horse had fallen, the trap was smashed, and my friend's hip was dislocated.
So now every one can see that there really is great practical inconvenience in living at the junction of the Is-not yet Is, or the Is and Is-not.
I have a coachman who has been in the family for seventy-five years, and is one of the last surviving representatives of the all-but-extinct race of Caleb Balderstone. This old man remembers the state of the country before most of the new roads were made, before Macadam's system was introduced, and very curious stories he can tell of the old roads, and the travelling thereon. Formerly the roads were – not exactly paved, but made by the thrusting of big stones into holes which they more or less adequately filled. Then on top of all were put smaller stones, picked up from the fields, and not broken at all. As I have got the old road near my gates, for about a mile, closed to all but foot-passengers – though the maps persist in attempting to send carriages over it – I can see exactly what they were. This bit of road is cut between banks eight and nine feet high, has been sawn through soil and rock by the traffic of centuries, assisted by streams of water in winter. The floor is a series of rocky steps, and I can recall when these steps were eased to the traveller by the heaping of boulders on them producing a rude slope. But as with every heavy rain a rush of water went down this road, it dislodged the boulders, and woe betide the horse descending the steep declivity of loosely distributed rolling stones on an irregular and fragile stair of slates.
My great-great-grandmother had a famous black bull. The contemporary Duke of B., who was a fancier of cattle, wanted to buy it, but madam refused to sell. Again he sent over, offering double what he had offered before, but was again refused. Then said the Duke, "Tell madam, that if she will sell me that bull, I will gallop my horse down the road without saddle or bridle." She sent him the bull as a present, without exacting the ride, which would have in all likelihood cost him his life.
In old novels the sinking of the wheel of a chaise in a mud-hole, or the breakage of the carriage, is an ordinary and oft-recurring incident. The wonder to me is, that chaises ever made any progress over these old roads without being splintered to atoms. How was it that china, glass, mirrors, ever reached the country houses intact? I applied to my coachman.
"Well, sir, you see, nothing was carried in waggons then, but on packhorses, that is to say, no perishable goods. My grandfather was a packman. Those were rare times." And he showed me the old packmen's traces, across the woods where now trees grow of fifty years' standing. Indeed, alongside of many modernized roads the old packmen's courses may still be traced. There was great skill required in packing; the packhorse had crooks on its back, and the goods were hung to these crooks. The crooks were formed of two poles, about ten feet long, bent when green into the required curve, and when dried in that shape were connected by horizontal bars. A pair of crooks, thus completed, was slung over the pack-saddle, one swinging on each side, to make the balance true. The short crooks, called crubs, were slung in a similar manner. These were of stouter fabric, and formed an angle; these were used for carrying heavy materials.
I shall doubtless be excused if I quote some old verses written fifty years ago, comparing marriage to a Devonshire lane, but which will equally apply to any old road —
"In a Devonshire lane, as I trotted along
T'other day, much in want of a subject for song,
Thinks I to myself, I have hit on a strain,
Sure Marriage is much like a Devonshire lane.
In the first place 'tis long, and when once you are in it,
It holds you as fast as a cage does a linnet;
For howe'er rough and dirty the road may be found,
Drive forward you must, there is no turning round.
But though 'tis so long, it is not very wide,
For two are the most that together can ride;
And e'en then, 'tis a chance, but they get in a pother,
And jostle and cross and run foul of each other.
Oft Poverty greets them with mendicant looks,
And Care pushes by them, o'er-laden with crooks;
And Strife's grazing wheels try between them to pass,
And Stubbornness blocks up the way on her ass.
Then the banks are so high, to the left hand and right,
That they shut out the beauties around them from sight;
And hence you'll allow, 'tis an inference plain,
That Marriage is just like a Devonshire lane!
But thinks I too, these banks, within which we are pent,
With bud, blossom, and berry are richly besprent;
And the conjugal fence, which forbids us to roam,
Looks lovely when decked with the comforts of home.
In the rock's gloomy crevice the bright holly grows;
The ivy waves fresh o'er the withering rose,
And the evergreen love of a virtuous wife
Soothes the roughness of care, – cheers the winter of life.
Then long be the journey, and narrow the way,
I'll rejoice that I've seldom a turnpike to pay;
And whate'er others say, be the last to complain,
Though Marriage be just like a Devonshire lane."
"Ah, sir!" said my old coachman, "them was jolly times. The packmen used to travel in a lot together, and when they put up at an inn for the night, there was fun; – not but what they was a bit rough-like. I mind when one day they found a jackass straying, and didn't know whose it was, nor didn't ask either. They cut handfuls of rushes, and with cords they swaddled the ass up with rushes, and then set alight to him. Well, sir, that ass ran blazing like a fireball for four miles before he dropped. Them was jolly times."
"Not for asses, Caleb?"
"Certainly not for asses."
"But why did the packmen travel together, Caleb?"
"Well, sir, you see, packmen at times carried a lot o' money about with them; and it did happen now and then that lonely packmen were robbed and murdered."
"Then hardly jolly times for packmen?"
"Well, I don't know," answered Balderstone, drawing his hand and whip across his mouth. "There was packmen then, and perhaps just here and there one got murdered; but now they are all put out of the way, which is worst of all."
After a little consideration Caleb went on – "Now, I mind a curious circumstance that happened when I was a young man, just about sixty years ago. At that time there were no shops about, and once or twice in the year I was sent with a waggon and a team up to the county town (thirty-five miles off) to bring down groceries and all sorts o' things for the year. I used to start at four in the morning. One autumn morning I had started before daybreak, and I lay in the covered waggon, and the two horses they knew the road and went on. But all at once both halted, and though I cracked my whip they would not stir. I got out with the lantern, and saw that they were all of a tremble, both with their heads down looking at something, apparently, in the road. I moved the lantern about, but could see nothing in the road, and then I coaxed the horses, but they would not stir a step; then I whipped them. All at once both together gave a leap into the air, just as if they were leaping a gate, and away they dashed along the road for a mile afore I could stop them, and then they were sweating as if they had been raced in a steeplechase, and covered with foam, and trembling still. Now I was away two days, and on the third I came back, and the curious thing is – when I came back I heard that a packer had been robbed and murdered whilst I was away at that very spot, and where my horses had leaped it was over the exact place where the dead man was found lying twenty-four hours later. If they'd jumped after the murder I'd have thought nothing of it, but they jumped before the man was killed."
Road-making was formerly intrusted to the parochial authorities, and there was no supervision. It was carried out in slovenly and always in an unsystematic manner. In adopting a direct or circuitous line of way, innumerable predilections interfered, and parishes not infrequently quarrelled about the roads. The dispute between broad and narrow gauges raged long before railway lines were laid. A market town and a seaport would naturally desire to have ample verge and room enough on their highways for the transport of grain and other commodities from the interior, and for carriage of manufactured goods, or importations to the interior. On the other hand, isolated parishes would contend that driftways sufficed for their demands, and that they could house their crops, or bring their flour from the mill through the same ruts which had served their forefathers.
After the Civil Wars an impetus was given to road-making; an Act was passed authorizing a small toll to pay for the maintenance of the highways. The turnpike gate was originally a bar supported on two posts on the opposite sides of the road, and the collector sat in the open air at his seat of custom. I remember fifty years ago travelling in Germany, where at the toll-gate was a little house; one end of the bar was heavily weighted, the other fastened by a chain that led into the turnpike man's room. The toll-man thrust forth a pole with a bag at the end, into which the coin was put, he drew in the bag at his window, unhooked the chain, and the weight sent the bar flying up, the carriage passed under, and then the bar was pulled down again.
The people did not see the advantage of the toll-bar when first introduced, and riots broke out. The road surveyor was mobbed and beaten, the toll-bar was torn away and burnt. Even with systematic mending, the old roads were bad, for the true principle on which roads should be made was not known. John Loudon MacAdam, born 1756, died 1836, was the first to draw attention to the proper mode of road-making. He was an American, of Scottish descent. In 1819 he published A Practical Essay on the Scientific Repair and Preservation of Public Roads, and in 1820, Remarks on the Present State of Road-making. How little science was thought to have to do with the roads may be judged from the fact, that under the heading of Roads, the old Encyclopædia Britannica of 1797 has not a word to say. "Road-making!" one may suppose a surveyor of that period to have said, "any fool can make a road. If one finds a hole anywhere, clap a stone into it."
I have walked over the St. Gotthard Pass, and there we have the old road traceable in many places, and we can compare it with the new road. The old one was paved here and there rudely. Some of our old English roads were likewise paved. MacAdam's principle was this. Make all roads with the highest point in the middle, then the water runs off it, instead of – as in the old roads – lodging in the middle. Next, do not pave the road at all, but lay in a bottom – metal it – with broken stones, to the depth of six or eight inches, and then cover these with another layer, broken smaller, to the depth of two or three inches. Then all will be welded together into a compact and smooth mass. MacAdam originally proposed that the small upper coat of stones should be laid on in a corduroy fashion across the road, but this was abandoned for an uniform covering, as more speedily applied, and more effective.
What a time people took formerly in travelling over old roads! There is a house just two miles distant from mine, by the new unmapped road. Before 1837, when that road was made, it was reached in so circuitous a manner, and by such bad lanes, and across an unbridged river, that my grandfather and his family when they dined with our neighbours, two miles off, always spent the night at their house.
In 1762, a rich gentleman, who had lived in a house of business in Lisbon, and had made his fortune, returned to England, and resolved to revisit his paternal home in Norfolk. His wish was further stimulated by the circumstance that his sister and sole surviving relative dwelt beside one of the great broads, where he thought he might combine some shooting with the pleasure of renewing his friendships of childhood. From London to Norwich his way was tolerably smooth and prosperous, and by the aid of a mail coach he performed the journey in three days. But now commenced his difficulties. Between the capital and his sister's dwelling lay twenty miles of country roads. He ordered a coach and six, and set forth on his fraternal quest. The six hired horses, although of strong Flanders breed, were soon engulfed in a black miry pool, his coach followed, and the merchant was dragged out of the window by two cowherds, and mounted on one of the wheelers; he was brought back to Norwich, and nothing could ever induce him to resume the search for his sister, and to revisit his ancestral home.
The death of good Queen Bess was not known in some of the remoter parishes of Devon and in Cornwall until the court mourning for her had been laid aside; and in the churches of Orkney prayers were put up for King James II. three months after he had abdicated.
"However," I asked of Caleb, "could the huge masses of granite have been moved that form the pillars in the church, and the gate-posts, and the fireplace in the hall?"
"Well, sir, on truckamucks."
"Truckamucks!"
"In the old times they didn't have wheels, but a sort of cart with the ends of the shafts carried out behind and dragging on the ground. In fact, the cart was nothing but two young trees, and the roots dragged, and the tops were fastened to the horse. When they wanted to move a heavy weight they used four trees, and lashed the middle ones together."
"No carts or waggons, then?"
"Only one waggon in the parish, and that your grandfather's, and that could travel only on the high-road. Not many other conveyances either."
It is a marvel to us how the old china and glass travelled in those days; but the packer was a man of infinite care and skill in the management of fragile wares.
Does the reader remember the time when all such goods were brought by carriers? How often they got broken if intrusted to the stage-coaches, how rarely if they came by the carrier. The carrier's waggon was securely packed, and time was of no object to the driver, he went very slowly and very carefully over bad ground. The carrier's life was a very jolly one, and few songs were more popular in the west of England than that of The Jolly Waggoner—
"When first I went a-waggoning, a-waggoning did go,
I filled my parents' hearts with sorrow, trouble, grief, and woe;
And many are the hardships too, that since I have gone through.
Sing Wo! my lads, sing wo!
Drive on, my lads, heigh-ho!
Who would not live the life of the jolly waggoner?
It is a cold and stormy night, and I'm wet to the skin,
I'll bear it with contentment till I get to the inn,
And then I'll sit a-drinking with the landlord and his kin.
Sing Wo! &c.
Now summer is a-coming on – what pleasure we shall see!
The small birds blithely singing, so sweet on every tree,
The blackbirds and the thrushes, too, are whistling merrily.
Sing Wo! &c.
Now Michaelmas is coming – what pleasure we shall find!
'Twill make the gold to fly, my lads, like chaff before the wind,
And every lad shall kiss his lass, so loving and so kind.
Sing Wo! &c."
Since the introduction of steam two additional verses have been added to this song —
"Along the country roads, alas! but waggons few are seen,
The world is topsy-turvy turned, and all things go by steam,
And all the past is passed away, like to a morning dream.
Sing Wo! &c.
The landlords cry, What shall we do? our business is no more,
The railroad it has ruined us, who badly fared before;
'Tis luck and gold to one or two, but ruined are a score.
Sing Wo! &c."
The leathern belt worn by the groom nowadays is the survival of the strap to which the lady held, as she sat on a pillion behind her groom. The horses ridden in those days must have been strong, or the distances not considerable, and the pace moderate, for to carry two full-grown persons cannot have been a trifle for a horse on bad roads.
"It is of some importance," said Sydney Smith, "at what period a man is born. A young man alive at this period hardly knows to what improvements of human life he has been introduced; and I would bring before his notice the changes that have taken place in England since I began to breathe the breath of life – a period of seventy years. I have been nine hours sailing from Dover to Calais before the invention of steam. It took me nine hours to go from Taunton to Bath before the invention of railroads. In going from Taunton to Bath I suffered between ten thousand and twelve thousand severe contusions before stone-breaking MacAdam was born. I paid fifteen pounds in a single year for repair of carriage-springs on the pavement of London, and I now glide without noise or fracture on wooden pavement. I can walk without molestation from one end of London to another; or, if tired, get into a cheap and active cab, instead of those cottages on wheels which the hackney coaches were at the beginning of my life. I forgot to add, that as the basket of the stage-coaches in which luggage was then carried had no springs, your clothes were rubbed all to pieces; and that even in the best society, one-third of the gentlemen were always drunk. I am now ashamed that I was not formerly more discontented, and am utterly surprised that all these changes and inventions did not occur two centuries ago."
