ough
it.

"We cannot prevent the coming of this water, and it only remains for us
to get rid of it, which can be speedily done if we go about it in the
right way. Very few people know how great an amount of water falls upon
the country road, and it may surprise some of us to be told that on each
mile of an ordinary country highway three rods wide within the United
States there falls each year an average of twenty-seven thousand tons of
water. In the ordinary country dirt road the water seems to stick and
stay as if there was no other place for it, and this is only because we
have never given it a fair opportunity to run out of the dirt and find
its level in other places. We cannot make a hard road out of soft mud,
and no amount of labor and machinery will make a good dirt road that
will stay good unless some plan is adopted to get rid of the surplus
water. Water is a heavy, limpid fluid, hard to confine and easy to let
loose. It is always seeking for a chance to run down a hill; always
trying to find its lowest level."

An essential feature of a good road is good drainage, and the principles
of good drainage remain substantially the same whether the road be
constructed of earth, gravel, shells, stones, or asphalt. The first
demand of good drainage is to attend to the shape of road surface. This
must be "crowned," or rounded up toward the center, so that there may be
a fall from the center to the sides, thus compelling the water to flow
rapidly from the surface into the gutters which should be constructed on
one or both sides, and from there in turn be discharged into larger and
more open channels. Furthermore, it is necessary that no water be
allowed to flow across a roadway; culverts, tile, stone, or box drains
should be provided for that purpose.

In addition to being well covered and drained, the surface should be
kept as smooth as possible; that is, free from ruts, wheel tracks,
holes, or hollows. If any of these exist, instead of being thrown to
the side the water is held back and is either evaporated by the sun or
absorbed by the material of which the road is constructed. In the latter
case the material loses its solidity, softens and yields to the impact
of the horses' feet and the wheels of vehicles, and, like the water
poured upon a grindstone, so the water poured on a road surface which is
not properly drained assists the grinding action of the wheels in
rutting or completely destroying the surface. When wa