quities, that such was the aspect of a great part of Britain, in the early periods of the Roman ascendancy; and that the forest trees in the vicinity of a great military thoroughfare, were thus decapitated to facilitate the security of an army on its march, by revealing the recesses of the surrounding country and precluding the danger of surprise.*

The most considerable of the Roman ways were paved with stones; but it would not appear to be likely, as is conjectured by Mr. Whitaker, that none, except such as were so paved, were intended for the transit of carts and waggons. Where the surface did not cousist of large paving stones, it was composed of gravel; and the durability of the road was greatly assisted by excellent drains, disposed with much care and judgment.†

From the preceding observations, the reader will scarcely fai to imbibe a favourable idea, as to the skill and perseverance exercised by the Romans, in the construction of their principal mediums of communication. But it is desirable to notice some objections which have been made to this persuasion, especially as they proceed from so respectable a pen as that of the historian of Manchester.

After asserting that the chief excellence of the Roman roads consists in the directness of their course, Mr. Whitaker observes that these roads "appear not to have been constructed upon the most sensible principles, in general." In support of this opinion, he notices certain points of two roads in Lancashire, in one of which the road is "a mere coat of sand and gravel, the sand very copious, and the gravel weak, and not compacted together with

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No motive, but that of obtaining a view of the adjacent tract of country, and thereby preventing the danger of a sudden attack from ambushed natives, has been ascribed as the probable cause of the Romans raising their roads to so great a height, even on a firm soil not subject to floods. Vide remarks on Roman roads, prefixed to the Hist. of Hertfordshire.

+ For more copious information concerning the construction of Roman roads, the reader is referred to Bergier's Histoire Des Grands Chemins De L'Empire Romain, &e.

with any incorporated cement," In the other instance, the road" is only a heap of loose earth and rock, laid together in a beautiful convexity, and ready to yield and open on any sharp compression from the surface. Such," continues Mr. Whitaker, "could never have been designed for the passage of the cart and waggon, as they must soon have been furrowed to the bottom by the wheels, or crushed into the ground by the load, and rendered absolutely impassable by either. But for these rough services they were not intended. Both of them, though the one was constructed for the great western way into the north, and the other was the line of communication between Chester and York, were plainly intended merely for the walker, the rider, and the beast of burden.

"The only roads that seem to have been designed for the waggon and the cart, are such as were regularly paved with boulders. But as this alleviates not the censure upon the nar rowness of the roads, so the paving of them is obviously an awkward expedient at the best. And this appears sufficiently from those boasted remains of the Romans, the Appian and Flamiuian ways, in Italy, which are so intolerably rough and hard that the travellers, as often as they can, turn off from them, and journey along the tracks at their borders.'

The circumstance of many of the Roman roads in Britain having continued to the present time, and some in excellent preservation, Mr. Whitaker supposes to have arisen chiefly "from the early desertion of such particular roads by the Britons and Saxons; new ways being laid, for new reasons, to the same towns; or the towns being destroyed, and the ways unfrequented." He concludes his objections in the following words: “But had they been always laid in right lines, always constructed with a sufficient breadth, and never paved with stone; had the materials been bound together by some incorporated cement; and had they been all calculated to receive carts and bear waggons, they

must

• Hist. of Manchester, p. 228.

must still be acknowledged to have one essential defect in them. They almost constantly crossed the rivers of the island, not at bridges, but at shallows, or fords, some of which nature had planted, and others art supplied. And, in this state of the roads, the travelling upon them must have been infinitely precarious, regulated by the rains and controuled by the floods."*

These opinions are entitled to respectful consideration, as they proceed from a writer who is often eminently judicious in his remarks. But it would appear that Mr. Whitaker, when treating generally of Roman roads, hazarded theoretical speculations founded on local and circumscribed inspection.-Deriving my information from a learned correspondent, who has personally investigated the principal Roman roads throughout Britain, aud who has greatly assisted in elucidating this branch of antiquarian research,† I venture to assert, with boldness, that it was scarcely possible for more skill and judgment to have been displayed in such works, than were evinced by the Roman engineers, in drawing the line to avoid all local inconvenience, or in completing the road when the outline was thus carefully formed. Mr. Whita ker's objection, as to the want of compactness in construction, may, perhaps, have arisen from the notice of some particular point, in which the road was not completed according to the original intention; or, as is more probable, from the view of a tract where the surface had been removed by innovation. That the principal roads were, originally, of great width, is unquestionable, although, in many instances, they have been made narrow by the depredations of those who have removed the soil from both sides; as may be clearly perceived in the Foss-way near Bath.

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* Hist. of Manchester, p. 229. Dr. Stukeley (Itin. Cur. p. 72.) views this presumed defect in so different a light, that he praises the Romans "for making few bridges, as liable to decay, and for laying fords with great skill and labour, many of which remain firm to this day."

The Rev. Thomas Leman, whose literary favours I have already frequently acknowledged.

Bath. It may be observed, that the Appian and Flaminian ways were rough, only when out of repair, and neglected.

But in no part of his objections has Mr. Whitaker fallen into a greater error, than when he asserts that the Roman ways crossed rivers at Fords only, and not by Bridges. It is observed by the accurate examiner to whom I am indebted for the points of this reply to the remarks of Mr. Whitaker, that his investigations have produced only one instance in which there is an appearance of having been originally a ford, and not a bridge; and, even in this instance, a doubt remains as to whether that which appeared to be au artificial ford, might not have been the foundation of a bridge.-The bridges having been destroyed by the barbarians, who succeeded to the Romans, we may readily suppose that the people who still continued the course of such mutilated roads, turned to the next ford; and, hence, the compulsory deviation may have been mistaken for the original track. Instances of such an unavoidable dereliction of ncient pathway, may be seen on the road from Sarum to Dorchester, and on the road from Cambridge towards the banks of the Nen.

These "are found on

It must be noticed, as a curious and strongly marked feature, that the Romans invariably constructed tumuli, or barrows, on the sides of their great roads in Britain. every eminence in the line of road, unless they have been since destroyed; and, generally, the two successive ones in sight of each other (as the direction, probably, by which the engineer originally laid out the road) as well as at all those places where any vicinal road branched off from the great street, or paved way, to some dependant camp or inferior station."*

It will be seen, from the notices presented in different volumes of the Beauties of England and Wales, that the present state of the Roman roads varies much in different counties. Extensive vestiges of the bold round causeway, which was constructed along the principal lines of these ways, are still perceptible in

Observations on the Roman roads in Leicestershire, &c.

many

many parts of the island; while, in others, all traces are obliterated by the operation of the plough; or all marks of Roman workmanship are lost, in the alternate traffic and repairs of successive ages. In tracts, however, where the ridge has been removed, but the road deserted as a channel of traffic, the former line of transit is frequently discovered, by the failure of the corn or grass; and, on penetrating the soil, to the depth of a foot or more, the ancient paving is often found, in a massy bed beneath the reach of the husbandman's ploughshare.

Whilst enumerating the most prominent marks by which the remains of Roman roads are generally to be distinguished, it may be desirable to present the following observation of the writer to whose discrimination I am so greatly indebted in several preceding pages. In regard to the investigator of Roman ways, who is intent on tracing the line, or continuation, of a particular road, great caution must be used, lest the person should be misled by roads having the same name with the one he is exploring; as generally all roads, or lanes, leading to such general road, are called by the name of the great road, or street, itself. Thus, at Leicester, the lane which leads to the Foss is called the Foss: thus, at Cirencester, the great road which comes from Winchester by Wanborough, in the part near Cirencester [through which the Foss itself passes] is called The Foss Road, though in a contrary direction from the general bearing of the Foss. And the same road near Winchester is called the Ikenield Street, though in a quite contrary bearing to that great British way, because it led to it. Many other instances may be given, because such mistakes exist about every station."*

It may also be noticed that the lines of the great public Roman roads are generally accompanied by towns, or villages, bearing names significative of their former situation on a well-known and important highway; as Stretton, Stratford, Streatley, &c. or appellations

* Rev. Thomas Leman on Roman roads, &c. Nichols's Leicestershire,