y, even
in the present day. The roads are made by each county, and as it depends
in great measure upon the caprice or convenience of the particular
proprietors or townships whether there shall be a road at all, or whether
it shall be at all better than a drift-way or a bridle-track, it often
happens that after bowling along for a score of miles upon a highway
worthy of Macadam, the carriage of the traveller plunges into wet turf or
heavy sand, merely because it has entered upon the boundary of a new
county. Nay, even where the roads have been hitherto good, it often
happens that the new Vicegespann, or Sheriff, a personage on whose
character a good deal depends in county business, allows them to go to
ruin for want of seasonable repairs. A similar irregularity was, in our
own country, put a stop to in the reign of Mary, when it was enacted that
each parish should maintain its own roads. A custom was borrowed from
the feudal system: the lord of the manor was empowered to demand from his
vassals certain portions of their labour, including the use of such rude
implements as were then in use. The peasant was bound by the tenure of
his holding, to aid in cutting, carting, and housing his lord's hay and
corn, to repair his bridges, and to mend his roads. A portion of such
services was, in the sixteenth century, transferred from the lord to the
parish or the district; and the charges of repairing the highways and
bridges fell upon the copyholder. He was compelled to give his labour
for six days in the year, and his work was apportioned and examined by a
surveyor. If this compulsory labour did not suffice, hired labour was
defrayed by a parochial rate: and although the obligation is seldom
enforced, yet it survives in letter in the majority of the court-rolls of
our manors.

So entirely indeed was speed in travelling regarded by our ancestors as
of secondary importance to safety and convenience, that even in
journeying by a public coach the length of a day's journey was often
determined by the vote of the passengers. The better or worse
accommodation of the roadside inns was taken into account; and it was
"mine host's" interest to furnish good ale and beef, since he was
tolerably certain that, with such attractions within-doors, the populous
and heavy-laden mail would not pass by the sign of the Angel or the
Griffin. Long and ceremonious generally were the meals of our
forefathers; nor did they abate one jot from thei