EOAD REFORM A PLAN FOE ABOLISHING TURNPIKE TOLLS AND STATUTE LABOUR ASSESSMENTS, AND FOE PEOVIDING THE FUNDS NECESSAEY FOE THE PUBLIC EOADS BY AN ANNUAL RATE ON HORSES. BY WILLIAM PAGAN, WRITER, “ W ery queer life is a pike-keeper’s, sir,” said Mr Weller; sen. “ A what ? ” said Mr Pickwick. “A pike-keeper.”— — “What do you mean by a pike-keeper?” inquired Mr Peter Magnus. “The old ’un means a turnpike keeper, gen’lm’n observed Mr Weller, in explanation. “ Oh,” said Mr Pickwick, “ I see. Yes; very curious life. Very uncomfortable.” “ They’re all on ’em men as has met vith some disappointment in life,” said Mr Weller, senior.” “Ay, ay?” said Mr Pickwick. “ Yes. Consequence of vich they retires from the world, and shuts themselves up in pikes ; partly with the view of being solitary, and partly to rnvenge themselves on mankind by takin’ tolls.”— Pickwick, p. 228. WILLIAM BLACKWOOD AND SONS, 45, GEORGE STREET, EDINBURGH, AND 37, PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON. M.D.CCCXLVL CUPAR- FIFE ! PRINTED IN THE FIFESHIRK JOURNAL OFFICE BY JAMES TOD. f/tA, PREFACE. The favourable reception accorded to the Author’s Plan of Road Reform, since its publication last year, induces him to offer this abridged edition. To place his scheme before the public in as narrow a compass as is consistent with the fair exposition of its merits, various Statistical Abstracts have been omitted which were given in the former edition. Cupar- Fife, May 1846. Isr submitting a proposal for abolishing the system of Tolls and Statute Labour Assessments, by which all the public roads and bridges in Scotland are maintained— excepting those in certain of the Highland counties — and for substituting an entirely new method of raising the funds necessary for these purposes, it appeared to us that the most satisfactory mode of illustration would be, to give a distinct view of the several statutes by which the roads of one or two counties 3 are regulated — of the financial operations of the Boad Trusts in these counties — and then to point out, as briefly as possible, the demerits ^ of the present system, and the nature of the substitute we would | propose. Taking the counties of Fife and Kinross as the most convenient t- example, we now lay before the public — 1. An Abridgement of the * nine Local Acts, and the General Turnpike Act, which regulate the J* roads and bridges of these two counties ; 2. An Abstract of three sk years’ Accounts of the twenty-eight Trusts into which these roads and bridges are divided ; and, 3. Our Plan for Abolishing Turnpike c| Tolls and Statute Labour Assessments wherever they exist, and for raising Boad Funds by an annual rate upon horses. These we have followed up by a collection of the Titles of the Scot- fish Boad Acts, 1707-1844 — Appendix (A) — to show the vast amount 4 of Boad Legislation ; and by a collection of law decisions respecting J Boad Tolls, 1821-1844— Appendix (B)— to give some idea of the great *4 trouble and expense incurred in construing such a variety of Boad '"Acts, and in enforcing the tolls thereby granted. PREFACE TO THE FIRST EDITION. (March 1845.) PREFACE. We have thus put the travelling public in a condition to become acquainted with the whole structure and working of the Toll-bar system. That system, in our judgment, ought to be immediately abolished. We think that a rate upon horses — the active agents in the tear and wear of the roads — is the simple, and equitable, and efficacious, substitute. But should a consideration of the facts we have stated, and of the arguments we have advanced, not induce the conviction that our scheme is an advisable one, it will be a gratification to us should the materials we have brought together lead to the adoption of some beneficial substitute for the present costly, unequal, and often unjust, system of providing funds for the public roads in the toll-bar coun- ties. We beg to tender our thanks to the Clerks, and Treasurers, and Surveyors, of the Fife and Kinross-shire Trusts for the financial in- formation supplied by them; and also to the gentlemen who have given us the benefit of their local knowledge, both in revising the lists of horses taken up by the constabulary, and in reference to other in- formation sought from them. ROAD REFORM In proposing tlie entire abolition of the existing system of raising the funds necessary for making and keeping in repair the public roads and bridges of the country by means of turnpike tolls and statute labour and bridge assessments, and the substitution of what we think a simpler and better mode, we shall, in the first place, give an outline of the way in which those funds are at present raised, so far as re- gards the counties of Fife and Kinross — which, we believe, may be considered as a fair exemplification of the general road management throughout the whole kingdom. Besides the ancient highways — which are usually left to take care of themselves — there are two classes of public roads in these counties, the offspring of modern acts of Parliament — the one distinguished as statute labour, and the other as turnpike. The subsisting acts for the two counties are ten in number, viz. : — 1. Fife Statute Labour Act (1797.) 2. Do. (1807.) 3. Fife Turnpike Act (1829.) 4. Burntisland and Granton Pier, Ferry, and Road Act (1842.) 5. Leven Bridge and Road Act (1839.) 6. Kinross-shire Statute Labour Act (1826.) 7. Kinross-shire, & c.. Turnpike Act (1831.) 8. Great North Road Act (1829.) 9. Kinross and Alloa Road (1829.) 10. General Turnpike Act (1831.) And under the powers contained in these ten statutes the roads and bridges are managed in twenty-eight different trusts, viz. : — 1. Cupar District Statute Labour. 2. St Andrews District Statute Labour. 3. Kirkaldy District Statute Labour. 4. Dunfermline District Statute Labour. 5. Fife Large Bridges. 6. Fife Lesser Bridges — Cupar District. 7. Do. St Andrews District. 8. Do. Kirkaldy District. 9. Do. Dunfermline District. 10. Fife Turnpikes — Cupar District. 11. Fife Turnpike and Statute Labour Roads — St Andrews District. 12. Fife Turnpikes — Kirkaldy District. 13. Do. Dunfermline General District. 14. Do. Whitehill Trust. 15. Do. Aberdour and Duloch Trust. 16. Leven Road and Bridge. 2 ROAD REFORM. 17 . Kinross-shire Statute Labour- —Kinross and Orwell District. 18. Do. Portmoak and Arngask District, 19. Do. Cleish and Fossaway District. 20. Kinross-shire, &c. Turnpikes— -Outh and Nivingston Trust. 21. Do. Carnock and Comrie Trust. 22. Do. Thomanean Trust. 23. Do. Cupar and Kinross Road. 24. Do. Auchtermuchty and Pitcairly Road, 25. Do. Scotland Well and Balgedie Road. 26. 27. 28. Do. Gfreat North Road. Kinross and Alloa Road. Cleish Trust. In our former edition, as alluded to in our preface, we gave abridge- ments of these ten statutes, and also abstracts, for the three pre- vious years, of the official accounts of the twenty-eight trusts — which abstracts form the ground-work of the statistical tables hereinafter contained. I. — The statute labour roads are' supported by annual assessments upon the w T hole heritors and tenantry in the two counties, and upon householders, &c., in certain districts — the assessment upon the heri- tors and tenants being at present, after several variations, at the five following different rates per ploughgate ( i.e . fifty Scots acres of land, or seventy pounds of rent, in the option of the person assessed), viz. : — In the County of Fife : — Cupar, St Andrews, and Kirkaldy Districts 36s. Dunfermline District 30s. In the County of Kinross : — Kinross and Orwell District 15s. Portmoak and Arngask District 16s. Cleish and Fossaway District — 25s. The only householders assessed are those within the Kinross and Orwell and Cleish and Fossaway Districts of Kinross-shire, and the rate upon them is Is. 6d. each. The annual exactions for statute labour, as shown in the adjoined Table 1.,- are: — Fife — Heritors, £6155, is. 5d. j Kirkaldy Burgh,* £15. Kinross-shire — Heritors, £395, 12s. 8d. ; householders, £46, 9s. 4d. Total, £6612, 3s. 5d. According to both the letter and the spirit of the statute labour acts, a portion of the burden of maintaining the statute labour roads was directed to be laid on the owners of all chaises, gigs, and carts let for hire, not exceeding the following maximum yearly rates, viz. Fife — Four-wheeled chaises, 20s - ; two-wheeled do., 10s. ; two-horse carts, 10s. ; one-horse carts, 5s. And Kinross — Four-wheeled chaises, £1, 10s. : two-wheeled do., 15s. ; two-horse carts, 10s. ; one-horse carts, 5s. But this part of the system has, from its obnoxious nature, fallen into desuetude, as has also the assessment directed to be laid upon householders, cottagers, labourers, and tradesmen, excepting only as regards the two districts in Kinross-shire above-mentioned. In this way the statute labour assessment has with us been allowed to fall nearly altogether upon the agricultural interest in the shape of assessments upon the ploughgates of land. In the two counties the statute labour roads are divided into seven districts, in each of which there is an assessor, who makes an annual * In Cupar Burgh there is an assessment under the statute labour acts upon individual inhabitants to the amount of about £25 yearly ; but that is applied to the streets and roads within the bounds of the burgh 5 assessments on burghs, for burgh streets and roads, do not fall within the scope of this publication. HOAD REFORM. 3 survey of the number of ploughgates, and in doing this he is em- powered by the statutes to require exhibition of tacks and rentals. He must give notice to all proposed to be assessed, and any one who may consider himself aggrieved has the power of appeal to a meeting of the trustees. On the surveys being approved by the trustees, the same are placed in the hands of the respective collectors, who pro- ceed to levy the assessments on the 25th March in each year, and en- force payment by summary diligence. This assessment, at the maximum rate of 36s. per fifty acres, is equal to about 18s. per horse — manifestly a severe burden, when it is con- sidered that it does not clear landlords and tenants of their share of the expense of maintaining public roads, as was the case when the acts for the conversion of statute labour were first passed, but leaves them liable for turnpike tolls to the fullest extent, as if they paid no statute labour money whatever. There are few agriculturists, indeed, of our two counties at least, who can find their way to market, manure, coal, &c., without being faxed at turnpike tolls ; and we have little doubt that, on the average, the direct and indirect tolls paid by agriculturists in the conducting of their business are not of less amount than what is assessed upon them in name of statute labour. The Fife and Kinross statute labour acts make the heritors liable, in the first instance, for the assessment, with recourse on the tenants and occupiers. In Kinross-shire, we believe, the assessment is imposed directly upon the tenants and occupiers ; but in Fife it is imposed on the proprietors, each in slump for his whole estate, and they are left to seek their relief from the tenants and occupiers. This gives a world of trouble to landlords and tenants. Upon the surveys being completed by the assessors, and the rolls put into the collector’s hands, payment is exacted from the landlords on the arrival of the 25th March. Then, supposing the case of a tenant who had entered at the previous Martinmas, in entire ignorance, it may be, of this system, he wonders very much when the landlord calls for the pur- pose of re-collecting from him his quota of the assessment. He wonders if the other tenants on the estate are taxed by the landlord in the same way ; and, indeed, a doubt may arise in his mind whether or not the factor may not possibly, in his allocation upon the tenants, make more out of them than the actual amount of statute labour on the whole estate. At any rate, he thinks he might have had indul- gence until he had got a year’s use of the roads ; or he thinks the landlord need not have troubled himself about this single item of charge till his first year’s rent fell due in the following year. Sup- posing, again, that the landlord, as is frequently the case, delays calling to re-collect from his tenant till after the first year’s rent falls due — by which time a second year’s statute labour for the farm has been levied from the landlord — then, when the landlord asks the tenant for repayment of the two years’ statute labour, the tenant wonders very much how it is possible that he should have to pay two years of that tax with his first rent. When there is only one rent, he thinks there should be only one year’s statute labour. But after a little demur, and probably a reference to some legal friend on the next market-day, he finds that there is no avoiding it — that the two years must be paid for — and that, in reality, the landlord had favoured him by delaying for a year to demand payment of what had fallen due on the 25th March immediately succeeding his entry. 4 ROAD REFORM. Other landlords, again, collect their tenants’ statute labour assess- ment along with each year’s rent — and the first rent payment being usually fifteen or eighteen months after the tenant’s entry, such land- lords are uniformly twelve months in advance, and so lose in the course of a tack a considerable sum of interest. In whichever way these transactions are managed, they undoubt- edly occasion a great deal of trouble, year after year, and term after term, to the landlords and their factors and agents, as well as to the tenants ; for the statute labour must always appear as a separate item in every statement of rent — so multiplying figures and swelling accounts. It will be seen from one of the subjoined tables that the names of so many as 789 landlords stand at this moment in the statute labour lists of the county of Fife. But large as this number is, it is small indeed compared with the number of tenantry from whom the landlords have to re-collect these assessments. One land- lord has to re-collect from so many as 72* ; another from 58 ; a third from 52 ; and so on. Independently of these considerations, numerous questions arise between landlords and tenants in reference to the statute labour of farms ; for instance, whether it was not understood that the landlord was to waive the privileges conferred by the act, and not charge the tenant with the statute labour ? — whether slump payments were not accepted as in full both of rent and statute labour ? and so on. The records of our law courts bear ample proofs of the evils arising from this system of things. Too frequently, indeed, has this matter of statute labour proved a source of discord betwixt landlord and ten- ant. In the case of small possessions the burden generally rests on the landlords, as they find the re-collection of the tax to be trouble- some and often impracticable. These evils, however — as has been again and again remarked by our agriculturists — would be submitted to, and submitted to cheer- fully, were they provided with good roads without farther expense. But, when they cannot set foot upon their next and best road, the turnpike, without being taxed for it as sharply as if they had never paid one farthing of statute labour money, they feel themselves suffer- ing under grievous oppression. Accordingly, as the annual road meetings come round, petitions for reduction of statute labour and tolls are got up in the different localities, and presented and sup- ported by the attendance of numerous bodies of the most respectable of our tenantry. But for their just complaints no remedy has yet been administered. They are still called upon by their landlords, in course of their re-collection, to pay (in the three eastern districts of * These 72 tenants pay as follows : — 2, £10 each ; 5, £G ; 10, £4 ; 13, £1, 10s. ; 24. 5s. ; and 18, Is. 6d.=£115, 17s. in all. An experienced professional friend has favoured us with the following note on this subject, illustrative of the difficulties in which factors and agents are involved by these questions of statute labour between landlord and ten- ant : — “ The amount of statute labour chargeable on estate amounts to £134, 7s. 4d., divided amongst 25 tenants, &c., some of them charged by the number of acres they occupy, and others by the rent, which varies according to the prices of grain yearly. My uniform practice has been to give a rental to the assessor to enable him to make all his charges, and I take the fiars of the preceding crop because those of the current crop have not then been struck. Upon receiving from the assessor the list as charged, I then check it, and, if correct, state it against the occupiers individually in my rental book, and collect it along with the rent. By this means the statute labour chargeable and due in March 1844 is added to the rent of crop 1843, which unavoidably occasions some difficulty in a change of tenants. As the statute labour is rated parochially, it happens in some cases that a tenant may occupy a farm situated partly in one parish, partly in two, or even three, and this occasions separate assessments.” ROAD REFORM. 5 Fife) at the rate of 36s. per ploughgate, or about 18s. per horse. In the western district of Fife the rate is 30s. per ploughgate. In Kin- ross-shire the rate is lower. But there, as will be seen by and by, the turnpike tolls are very greatly higher than in Fife, according to the weights ; so that, counting statute labour and tolls together, the tenantry of the one county may, in the matter of road expenses, be reckoned much on a footing of severity with the tenantry of the other. The statute labour acts give the persons qualified as trustees the power of determining the amount to be assessed ; and sometimes, as in Forfarshire, this power is exercised at annual meetings in each parish ; and, at other times, as in Fife and Kinross shires, the assess- ment is laid on at meetings of districts composed of several parishes. When each parish assesses, and collects, and expends for itself, the patch-work is exceedfngly beautiful. The having passable or impas- sable roads depends on the caprice of the majority, and innumerable have been the contentions in the administration of this piece of parish business. A gentleman who is non-resident may not care what sort of roads there are, so long as his old-fashioned tenants make their way “ through dub and mire,” and are punctual at term-day with their meagre rents. Another gentleman, however, who resides in the parish, and would like decent roads, as a step to further improve- ments, urges the propriety of an increased assessment, but he happens to be the smaller heritor of the two, and, however anxious for bet- tering the condition of the district, all his efforts towards that end are checkmated by the non-residenter, who thinks the roads well enough, and resists’ every proposition for their amendment — at least if he is to bear any part of the expense. Cross purposes such as these often keep a wide locality in a backward and barbarous state, and show most strikingly the impolicy of having the matter of public roads under parochial control. Then, when an assessment is voted, a scramble often ensues for the allocation of it— a scramble which results for or against the compet- ing parties according to the number of trustees whom they can cajole, by rhyme or reason, to come up and vote for them. We would have the disposal of all these matters placed under the impartial adminis- tration of county boards, to be appointed annually, for the manage- ment of all the roads in each county. II. The bridges (which, excepting the new bridge at Leven, are comprehended under the statute labour acts) are maintained in Kin- ross-shire from the statute labour funds. In Fife they are upheld from a variety of different sources : — 1. By an assessment on the whole heritable property in Fife (exclusive of the nineteen royal burghs), according to the valuation-roll of the county made up in the year 1695, commonly called “ the valued rent.” This assessment is at the rate of twenty shillings Scots, or Is. 8d. sterling, on each hundred pounds, and is payable by the proprietors. From this as- sessment they have no relief from the tenants, and in the last three years it has averaged £497, 13s. 3d. sterling. 2. The trustees, at their general annual meeting, on the first Tuesday of May, are author- ised to assess the whole heritors of the county in an additional sum, not exceeding 3s. 4d. sterling, upon every hundred pounds of valued rent : And in case the general meeting shall not assess the county to that extent, then all or any of the district meetings have power to 6 ROAD REFORM. assess themselves respectively in what farther sum they shall judge necessary, not exceeding 3s. 4d. per hundred pounds. 3. In case the rebuilding or repairing of any bridge shall exceed eighty pounds, the district in which it is situated shall be subject to one-half of the sum, and the other three districts shall be subject to the other half- — the money to be expended by direction of a general meeting of trustees for the whole county. 4. By appropriating from the whole statute labour funds a sum not exceeding 2s. 6d. sterling per plough- gate, to be applied in building bridges, the expense of which respec- tively exceeds the sum of £300. And 5. In the case of the Leven bridge by the rent received from the tacksman of the pontage thereon — the only pontage in Fife — and by composition from an individual. It would not be easy to conceive or devise a more complicated system of raising funds for a public object. Why so many separate modes of assessment ? Why a general meeting of trustees for the whole county to appropriate a certain sum from the statute labour funds and then to assess so much upon each district, and then over and above to have four supplementary assessments by the districts themselves ? Moreover, why not, as in some other counties, provide the expense of bridges out of the road funds, as necessary parts of the roads ? Trustees who can superintend the making of roads are surely capable of superintending bridges. The trustees under the statute labour and bridge acts, and the turnpike trustees, are nearly the same, and it is adding much to their work to divide their duties in the fanci- ful way which has been done, and to say to them at such and such parts of the road their duties as turnpike trustees cease, and their duties as trustees of bridges commence, and that they must keep their turnpike money in one pocket, the statute labour money in another, and the bridge money in a third. Then suppose that one of the pockets — the bridge money for instance — gets empty, necessity com- pels them to fall upon some contrivance by which they can transfer a sum from one of the other pockets— probably under the sanction of a handsome fee to some ingenious counsel — the expedient being, in the case supposed, to call the abutments and approaches to the bridge not part of the bridge but part of the road, and then, presto, the road money flies into the bridge pocket. III. — The turnpike roads are supported from a variety of different sources : — 1. By rents received from the tacksmen of the numerous tolls — the rates of tolls being widely different in the same county, and different often in different districts of the same county, so that the burden is most unequally laid on. The following are the several rates of tolls upon carts in the counties of Fife and Kinross : — EXCESS IN FIFE. KINROSS-SHIRE. KINROSS-SHIRE, Not exceeding 16 cwt. — — 4d. ... Os. 4d. ... Os. Od. Exceeding 16 but not 20 cwt. 4d. ... Os. 6d. ... Os. 2d. Exceeding 20 and not exceeding 22 C wt. - 4d. ... Os. fid. ... Os. 4d. Not exceeding 25 cwt. 4d. . . Os. 9d. ... Os. 5d. 25 and not exceeding 30 cwt. 6d. ... Is. 2d. ... 0s. 8d. 30 but not exceeding 35 cwt. fid. ... 2s. Od. ... Is. 4d. Not exceeding 40 cwt. lOd. ... 2s. lOd. ... 2s. Od. 2. By tolls on certain public coaches reserved by the trustees, and collected for their behoof by their several treasurers. The Fife act ROAD REFORM. 7 authorises a charge of 9d. upon every horse drawing any coach, &c., while the Kinross act authorises the larger charge of Is. These rates have been departed from in several instances so far as public coaches are concerned — the rates being reduced in Fife mostly to 6d. per horse each time of the coach passing or repassing. 3. By sums paid by in- dividuals under special agreement with the trustees of a district as a composition for their tolls throughout the whole of that district, as in the case of the medical men in Cupar and Kirkaldy districts, or for only one toll, as in the case of Bennochy bar, Kirkaldy district. The very few compositions, however, which have been effected with the trustees clearly show that considerable difficulties attend such trans- actions, and that, in fact, the public at large never can be said to have had any benefit whatever from the clauses authorising compositions. The farmer or manufacturer desiring the composition offers what he thinks enough ; the trustees, or their officers, think it too little ; the offer is refused, and the usual result is, either that the intended traffic is stopped, at least very much limited, or that the party finds vent for it through some other, probably an illegitimate, channel — the going round, for instance, by an old highway or a statute labour road, though to the destruction of his horses and carts, and the tear and wear of a greater length of road. 4. By allocations to a large amount drawn from time to time from the statute labour funds of the adjoining pa- rishes, and which are expended upon the turnpike roads by the turn- pike trustees along with the proper funds of these roads. The tolls, after due advertisement, are let by public roup, and those preferred must either grant bills with sufficient cautioners, or make a deposit of the whole, or a considerable proportion, of the rents by way of security. The usual practice is to make the rents payable by twelve monthly instalments, and in case of failure, which seldom happens, it is the duty of the treasurers to enforce payment. Where the tenants lodge deposits instead of placing their friends under obligations by putting their names on security bills, the tenants, at the expense of the road funds, are allowed interest at the ordinary rate — 4 or 5 per cent. — though the deposit may only yield 2 per cent, of bank interest to the trustees. In such transactions there is an obvious loss to the road funds. The coach tolls are also usually collected monthly by the trea- surers, except in the case of the mail-coaches, which are paid once a quarter upon applications to the General Post-Office, Edinburgh. These are submitted by the Post-office for the inspection of the sur- veyor of mail-coaches. They are next sent to the Postmaster-General in London, who, upon due examination, returns them to the General Post-Office in Edinburgh, by whom thereafter payment is made. These applications for mail-coach tolls coming in quarterly masses from all parts of the kingdom, and the periodical settlement of them, are attended with very great trouble to the Post-Office authorities, besides being a heavy downdraught on the penny post revenue. The following table exhibits the amount of money which has actually been levied, in the several modes above pointed out, from the public under the statute labour and turnpike acts for Fife and Kinross shires, and the Great North Road, and Kinross and Alloa Road : — TABLE I. AVERAGE AMOUNT LEVIED DURING THE YEARS 1841 , 1842 . I OF FIFE AND KINROSS, THE GREAT NORTH I LEVIED UNDER THE STATUTE No. NAME OF TRUST. For conversion pf ploughgates, payable by pro- prietors with relief against tenants. No. of persons from whom collect- ed. ‘For conversion of personal ser- vices of house- holders, &C. No. of persons from whom collect- ed. I. Fife Statute Labour — Cupar District £1889 4 2 354 II. St Andrews District 1746 11 4 271 III. Kirkaldy District 1352 17 7 114 £15 0 0 ('corpo- ration) IV. Dunfermline District 727 18 6 50 V. Fife Large Bridges 438 9 10 789 VI. Fife Lesser Bridges — Cupar District VII. St Andrews District VIII. Kirkaldy District IX. Dunfermline District X. Fife Turnpikes — Cupar District XI. St Andrews District XII. Kirkaldy District XIII. Dunfermline General Dist... XIV. Whitehill XV. Aberdour and Duloch XVI. Leven Road and Bridge XVII. Kinross-shire Statute Labour Kinross and Orwell Dis- trict 192 8 1 122 17 2 142 A1 10 A 401 XVIII. Portmoak and Arngask District Un- IJd 4 XIX. Cleish and Fossaway Dis- trict 80 7 5 known 33 A. 17 fl 4 1/ V 46 XX. XXI. Kinross-shire, &c. Turnpikes — Outh and Nivingston Carnock and Comrie XXII. Thomanean XXIII. Cupar and Kinross XXIV. Pitcairlie XXV. Scotland well and Balgedie XXVI. Cleish XXVII. Great North Road XXVIII. Kinross and Alloa Road £6550 14 1 £61 9 4 Annual Average Amount of the above Levies. TABLE I. & 1843, UNDER THE ROAD AND BRIDGE ACTS, FOR THE COUNTIES ROAD, AND THE KINROSS AND ALLOA ROAD. LABOUR ACTS. I No. of In name of bridge persons money payable by proprietors with- out relief. £155 15 6 197 8 2 97 8 10 47 0 9 £497 13 3 from whom collect- LEYIED UNDER THE TURNPIKE ACTS. Collected by the Trustees for coach toll- duties. Compositions, &c., collected by the Trustees from individuals. >■710 710 £393 9 9 206 18 0 420 0 11 62 2 2 46 15 8 72 12 0 30 9 4 2029 11 ,0 £3261 18 10 £402 4 7 £7 9 8 55 0 0 11 12 6 10 0 2 5 2 0 6 0 6 6 0 318 5 3 £3403 3 3 3185 2 9 4034 9 2 1061 17 2 59 6 8 219 13 4 788 0 0 463 13 4 144 10 0 128 0 0 452 18 0 85 1 8 371 6 97 17 8 4086 9 2 396 6 8 £18,977 15 6 Estimated sums collected for tacksmen’s re- muneration over their rents. £680 12 7 637 0 6 806 17 10 212 7 11 17 43 18 157 12 0 92 14 9 28 18 0 25 12 0 90 11 17 0 74 5 19 11 6 817 5 10 79 5 8 100 | £3795 11 5 Length of roads in miles. e <3 05 1-5 123£ 72 79£ 64 £ 134f 68 34 4 11 H 36f 4 14 201 5f 7 18 18 12 39J 394 483 ..£33,547 7 0 Turnpikes. 10 ROAD REFORM. In the preceding table, 20 per cent, over the toll- rents is assumed as the average amount of the tacksmen’s remuneration. We have considerable hesitation in naming this limited sum, as individuals of experience have estimated the tacksmen’s remuneration at a higher rate. The tacksmen and their collectors, who are employed in refer- ence to the tolls above mentioned, number so many as one hundred ; and dividing among them the sum of £3795, 11s. Id., which is 20 per cent, over their rents, they have an average of £37, 19s. Id. each. This, considering that they must give constant attendance day and night — some tolls indeed requiring the attendance of two persons— is not an over recompense. The tacksmen, as a class, form a body of respectable persons, all of them either possessed of capital to pay their rents in advance, and thereby draw good interest on the amount (which gives them a double profit), or they are in sufficient credit to be backed by responsible monied parties, who will bind themselves as their cautioners for the punctual payment of the rent instalments as they fall due. With few exceptions, the tacksmen have no other employment or means of sup- port for themselves and their families than what they can make off their tolls over and above the rents. From that surplus they must defray the ordinary expenses of their families — of their going annually from place to place attending roups of tolls — of their flittings when such shall be — of their monthly remittances to the treasurers — of law expenses in their frequent prosecutions for toll-duties or for penalties on account of alleged evasions, or in defending themselves against prosecutions for penalties on account of alleged over-exactions — as well as other contingencies. And over and above all, there should be — and undoubtedly in most cases there is — remaining to the tacks- men, else the profession would not be followed, a sum of greater or less amount to lay past as clear profit. As one criterion of estimating the amount of the tacksmen’s re- muneration, we may mention that, where several tolls are taken by the same persons or company, the ordinary allowance made by such farmers of tolls to their collectors is 2s. per day, or £36, 10s. per annum, besides free house, coal, and candle, which makes their wages considerably more than our estimate. Indeed it is clear to common sense that less remuneration would not secure the services of honest and respectable collectors. Persons, we doubt not, may be found, and found in abundance, who would most readily undertake the office of collector at half of that wage — nay, at a nominal wage. But where, with such people, would the farmers of the tolls, or the road trustees, have security for a faithful accounting ? A niggardly and inadequate weekly wage would just compel the starved collector, in his necessities, to encroach upon the monies drawn by him for his employer. He would be much in the situation of the labourer in the story, who hired himself at half the ordinary wage, and when asked how he could subsist upon it, very frankly replied, “ Please your honour, I am often finding things !” An instance occurred at no great distance where the Trustees, for some reason or other, took a bar into their own hand, and appointed their own collector, at a low wage — a person esteemed, of course, at the date of his appointment, to be a most trustworthy individual — one with whom the whole proceeds of the bar — nay, the whole road funds of the county — might most safely be confided. In a few weeks, however, it was observed that he was too good a customer to the ad- ROAD REFORM. 11 joining alehouse ; and many times the overjoyed passenger got through the bar without paying. His alehouse expenditure, as a ne- cessary consequence, diminished his weekly returns to the road sur- veyor or treasurer. He was found out and dismissed in solemn silence — probably to conceal the failure of the attempt to collect the revenue in such a mode, instead of the old fashion of letting the tolls with all their profits, large as they might be. The dismissed collector was, in the course of things, succeeded, through the judicious selection of the trustees or their officers, by a man of irreproachable sobriety and unimpeached integrity— for he had never before had in his hands anything of his neighbours’ to make away with. He in turn, however, fell under the breath of slander; for the tacksman of a neighbouring toll, under the impulse of conscientious feelings, sharpened probably by a desire to upset the collectorship system, which was to undermine the toll-tacksmen, took care to let out that the x weekly return of the new collector was some ten or twelve shillings less than it should have been, as appeared from the number of his tickets received at the check. Here, over and above the stipulated wage, were some five and twenty or thirty pounds a-year of the public revenue getting quietly absorbed by the new collector, as a slight indemnification to him for the small wage on which he had been placed by his econo- mical employers. Unless in very rare instances, this system of disappointing the toll-keepers of their birthright, and of appointing collectors under the trustees, has not been tried in Fife. But were the toll-keepers paid off, we would like to know how, in such an extensive county, and with such an host of collectors as are needed, the system could be wrought ? The trustees themselves could not pretend to select those collectors, at least they would disdain to maintain that surveillance over them, that everlasting espionage without wffiich the system cannot be carried on. Would that respectable body — the road treasurers — implicate themselves in this business ? or would the road surveyors forsake their civil-engineering duties and degrade themselves by trying to catch a stealthy collector, who might keep a few pence a-day to him- self more than he should do ? To work out such a system as this, an inspector of collectors, at a handsome salary, would be needed in each locality, whose activity and honesty would require to be undoubted, and to be paid for accord- ingly. Any collusion between him and his subs would be utterly ruinous to the road trusts, undetected, as it might be, till after a long course of peculation. Besides his own allowance, he would require secret service money, otherwise he never could purchase information respecting defaulters, or get at anything like an adequate knowledge of the multifarious mysteries of toll cheating and toll taking. Our idea is, that it would require Fouche himself, with a legion of the French police, for such a county as Fife, to get even a glimpse of the true character of underpaid collectors and the contents of their toll pockets. Not unfrequently instances are known where, over and above a livelihood, considerable sums have been realised by the tacksmen — sums sufficient to enable them to retire from public life with a com- fortable independence ; though up to that moment, it may be, they had been decrying their profession as the most miserable and profit- less that any man could pursue, and as only one degree better than downright beggary. 12 ROAD REFORM. According to our estimate, each of the one hundred toll-keepers in Fife and Kinross shires has an annual average profit, over and above his rent, for the maintenance of his family and other expenses, of £37, 19s. Id. — a sum which, looking to all the circumstances above adverted to, we have no doubt is fully realised, if not regularly year after year, in every instance at least on the average of years. So far as the public are concerned, it matters not though one half of the tacksmen realise little or nothing for themselves if it so happen that the other half realise large sums, not merely sufficient for their main- tenance but something in the shape of handsome accumulations. The perseverance with which the tacksmen are known to adhere to this pro- fession, when once entered upon, may be reckoned as one, and a pretty safe test, that it is a paying one. But were it otherwise — were it in the nature of a mere gambling speculation, more likely to ruin than to benefit the party — then that would be a strong argument for put- ting an end to transactions having such consequences. We are sure, however, that we are not far wrong in holding that the .tacksmen, one year with another, make well out, and that the recompense we have assigned to them is by no means over-rated. It may be said that there is now so much competition at the roups of tolls that the tenant’s assumed remuneration will not hold after paying the rents. But great though the competition has been, it has not disabused the trustees in some quarters of the opinion that the profits of the tacksmen are so excessive that they (the trustees) should keep the tolls in their own hands, and employ their own collectors. Such trustees, as well as the farmers of tolls, endeavour to check the fidelity of their collectors by changing them from time to time without any previous notice or warning. They will carry off one bodily from his post at midnight, and set him down at another of their bars some ten or twenty miles distant, translating at the same time their collec- tor at that bar to the charge left by the first, or to some other of their vacancies : and always taking care, for the sake of their pockets, that the bars shall be free as few minutes as possible. The object of such extraordinary movements is to enable the trustees or the toll-farmers to check the receipts of the several collectors by comparing them with each other ; and the result may naturally be anticipated, that the one who yields up the least amount of collection, though probably the most honest man in the world, is turned off as an unprofitable steward. The treating of the collectors in this way is calculated to provoke them to lay their heads together in order to protect the interests of their class, and agree upon the amount which it is proper for each to return as the proceeds of the same bar for the same space of time, and never to be exceeded. In the county of Edinburgh the tolls were let in the ordinary way up to 1841, when the trustees resolved to try the experiment of taking them into their own hands — an experiment which has succeeded very ill, as, under it, the tolls in each of the three following years re- turned less by about three thousand pounds than the rents which had been paid by the tacksmen. The experiment, therefore, is not one likely to be followed ; but we give Mr McConnell’s report to the trustees, describing the peculiar machinery by which it is worked : — Without adducing any arguments in favour of the experiment you have already deter- mined on making with regard to the general collection of the tolls of this county, I will confine this Report to an explanation of the method which appears to me most likely to stcure success, and to a calculation of the expenses attendant on it. ROAD REFORM. 13 The total annual revenue raised at the bars of this county (including tolls taken from mail and stage coaches) is, according to the existing leases, about . £32,500 0 0 For the collection of this revenue there are 79 bars, of which 18 may be considered as belonging to the class first in importance from the amount col- lected at them, or from their situation as checks on other gates ; 40 are of a second class, the collection at which varies from £600 to £80, exclusive of coaches, and is attended with no particular difficulty ; 17 are check-bars, where the receipts are trifling, but where constant attendance is re- quired ; 4 are check-bars, where only occasional attendance, on the occurrence of fairs, &c., is called for. 79 You have thought proper to recommend the appointment of an inspector to superin- tend the collection of the tolls paj^able at these different bars. It will be his duty, with all due consideration for the public, to enforce the payment of the tolls according to the specified rates, and to secure to the trustees a just return of the revenue so collected. To further these indispensable objects, it will be necessary to place in the hands of the inspector the power of enforcing the honest operation of the system — an end he can only attain by possessing the means of acquiring an accurate knowledge of all the details of traffic in every part of the county. With this important object in view, I should consider it desirable to place under his direction three assistants, to be constantly employed in their appointed districts, in making such observations as may be necessary to enable the inspector to ascertain the value of the respective bars. These assistants should make themselves thoroughly acquainted with the localities of their districts, receive from the toll-collectors all reports upon difficult cases of dis- puted liabilities, and transmit them to the inspector. The inspector will report any such difficulty to the clerk of the district in which it occurs, and receive instructions from him on the proper mode of proceeding. One of the assistants should be placed in Dalkeith, to superintend a district surround- ing that town ; a second should take charge of a district comprehending the Cramond tolls ; the third should be stationed in Edinburgh, in order that he may be at the dis- posal of the inspector for occasional services, and for copying accounts. The *whole of the road- surveyors at present in the county will be instructed to give their co-operation in checking the collections, and on all possible occasions to assist the toll collectors in the discharge of their duty. The collections made at some of the bars will be paid into the bank daily — others every second day, and those of less importance will be paid weekly ; and the inspector will be directed, at the commencement of each week, to furnish the clerk of every district with a statement, whereby he can check the payments made to his credit in the bank ac- count. A separate account will be kept for each bar, which will be verified by a weekly return of traffic and receipts from the collector. This return will be made in detail by the keeper of every gate, excepting a few of the first class, where the traffic is too extensive to admit of notes being taken ; in such cases an account of the receipts, signed by the toll-collector, is all that can be obtained ; but as two or three supernumerary collectors of confidential character must be constantly employed to give assistance at the most important gates as occasion requires, their notes, taken in succession at the different bars, will afford the inspector a fair criterion by which to estimate the correctness of the returns made to him. * * * * The expense of the establishment, over and above the cost of lighting lamps, stationery, &c., will be as follows 18 1st class collectors — average, 18s. per week — £842 per annum. 40 2d class do. do. 10s. ” 1040 17 Check-bar do. do. 5s. ” 221 ” 4 Do. do., occasional, and three supernu- merary collectors at 1st class bars, say, 150 ” Total for collectors Inspector £200 3 Assistants at £70, £60, £50 180 Total superintendence and collectors, £2633 per annum, Being about 8 per cent, on the present revenue.* * But taking £3000 from the gross produce, and adding to the salaries the contemplated £200 of ex- tra allowance to the inspector, the former would be £29,500, the latter £2833— that is well up to 10 per cent.— and that independent of the cost of lighting lamps, stationery, &c., and of the cost of prosecu- tions for evasions of toll— all which, under this system, falls on the trustees. .£2253 380 14 ROAD REFORM. Of this, the payments to collectors may be considered as an expense which must have been equally incurred under the old system of toll-leases ; and supposing the duty to be honestlj' and efficiently performed, £380, the amount to be paid for superintendence, is not nearly equal to the profit lessees would expect to make on transactions so extensive — to say nothing of the saving of the expense annually incurrred for toll-leases, &c. The assistants to the inspector should be on the spot three weeks, and the toll-collec- tors one week, prior to the commencement of their duties, in order that they may make themselves acquainted with the details of the business they will be expected to perform. Over and above the salary of £200 per annum to the inspector, you have recommended that he should be allowed £10 per cent, upon any excess in his collection above a certain sum, to be fixed on fair grounds, it being always understood that this per centage should not in one year exceed £200. You have also requested me to report to you upon the sum which the collection may be fairly expected to realise, and the amount at which the per centage to the collector ought to commence. The present rental of the tolls affords the fairest criterion on which estimates of the receipts for next year might be grounded ; but a degree of uncertainty must prevail where the traffic is so dependent on contingencies. The tolls in the Cramond district are expected to rise from an increase in building operations, while those in the Calder and Corstorphine districts may naturally be ex- pected to decline on the opening of the Edinburgh and Glasgow Railway, and the stop- page of the Lochrin Distillery will affect the Wrightshouses toll. With such changes in prospect, I find it would at present be impossible to form any estimate of the extent to which these districts may be affected ; but as, at the close of the year, the works that have been carried on at Craigleith can be ascertained, and the loss from the railway tested, by the decrease in the tolls in adjacent counties, I think it would be better that this question should remain unsettled until that time, feeling per- fectly satisfied that the interests of the inspector will be equally well consulted by thus leaving the case to your impartial decision. I am not aware of any other circumstances to which it is necessary to call your atten- tion ; and in concluding, must express my best wishes for the success of the experiment you have undertaken, and assure you that I have every confidence in the zeal and in- tegrity of the persons to be engaged in it, and at the same time feel convinced that you will not measure the benefits of the change by the results of the first year, as, for some time, the inspector will have to combat with the great disadvantage of inexperience on the part of those employed under him. 1 have the honour to be, my lords and gentle- men, your most obedient humble servant, Road Office, County Rooms, (Signed) J. M'CONNELL. Edinburgh, April 23, 1841. In an instance which has come to our knowledge in a Scottish county, the trustees attempted this mode of collection by means of their road surveyor, and through him they selected and appointed the toll-collector. He, again, gave the watchword to the labourers on the roads to keep an eye to what was going on, for the purpose of seeing that the collector did not sleep at his post, but collected rigorously, and gave a faithful weekly return, and also of checking any attempts at evading the toll, which, as being in the hands of the trustees, would be a trick more sweet to many than if in the hands of a toll-keeper. These metal-men found this new employment of wandering up and down the roads, counting carts here and gigs there — seeing whether a person improperly got ^ ticket at the one place and gave it at the other — much lighter than their former toilsome means of livelihood, and enjoyed the thing vastly. All this time, however, their bings of metal did not fructify much ; and the cruel ruts remained unfilled up : there was no difference, however, in the trustees’ accounts, as this system of watching and warding was entered net as “paid so much for spies,” but under the very appropriate title of “ surface work.” Would that there were a system which would relieve all road surveyors and surface-men of such odious and ridiculous occu- pations, and allow the public to get the benefit of their services in a legitimate way. So long, then, as turnpike toll-bars are in existence, we hold that the only feasible mode of wmrking them is by letting them by public ROAD REFORM. 15 roup to the highest bidder, even though the tacksman may be “ pass- ing rich with forty pounds a-year.” There are tricks in all trades, as the proverb hath it ; and the stories that are afloat in reference to tricks in toll-taking are innumerable, and it would be endless to attempt any recapitulation of them. In- stances where the same tacksmen have, year after year, taken the same bars in the face of their own reiterated protestations that they were losing largely by them and would never again bid for them, are of frequent occurrence. Notwithstanding all their lamentations, they have been found ready, by themselves, or more frequently by some concealed friend — probably an apparently antagonist tacksman — to come forward and bid for the bar, and carry it too, sometimes even at a higher rate than the previous year, at which, as was said, it had been so totally ruinous. In such transactions the trustees are sellers and the tacksmen buyers ; and the latter use the ordinary privilege of buyers in decrying and cheapening the goods as much as they possibly can. An instance of a different, of a fraudulent description, occurred within our own knowledge, where a gentleman, who had a quarrel with a toll-keeper in his neighbourhood, overbid him at the next roup and became tenant himself. He could not, however, himself become collector, and selected a very decent sort of man for the office. At the end of the year this individual reported that it was a losing con- cern, and that there was actually a deficiency of five pounds, which the gentleman had to make up. This cooled his revenge. But what was his surprise when his trusty collector appeared a few days after- wards at the roup of the same bar, and, after a keen competition, actually became tenant of it at a rise of fifty pounds above the former rent ! But admitting that in the general case the tolls which have stood and been tested for a period of years may be pretty well paid for through competition, still, on the first erection of a bar, it is very difficult to form a proper estimate of what it will produce. It may get into the hands of a discreet tacksman, who, while making his own of it, has the address to persuade others that it is next to a bankrupt concern. In this way he may hold it for a number of years, to the serious loss of the road funds. We are assured of an instance where a bar worth a thousand per annum (and which now annually lets at a higher sum) was held by one person for a series of years at only three hundred pounds ; and we have no doubt that those conversant with such matters will know many instances of profits from toll-bars little less remarkable. Again, even where a bar has stood and been tested for a num- ber of years, it often happens that new sources of traffic rise up, which considerably augment the levies from the public, without, however, in the least enlarging the revenue of the road trustees — the tacksman still complaining of his desperately bad bargain. This may go on, and often does go on, for a long time, as the tacksmen seldom compete with each other, unless — which rarely happens — some new hand comes forward and puts one of them out, when he again, in self-preservation, must attack even his next neighbour — with whom he was wont to take sweet counsel — and so cause a change of tenants, probably, throughout the whole tolls in the district. A farther, and sometimes an enormous, profit arises to the tacks- men of tolls on the occasion of great public events happening unex- 16 ROAD REFORM. pectedly in tlie district, which, however much they take from the pockets of the public in the shape of tolls, never add one farthing to the revenue of the road trustees. We allude to such matters as the gratification of a Royal Visit, a general election with a few keen county contests, or a Burns’ Festival — all of them producing rich harvests at the public expense to the fortunate toll-keepers. But while all these windfalls accrue to the tacksmen, and while they never — at least in any case within our knowledge — have paid a larger rent than the sum actually stipulated, we find them frequently coming forward claiming, and sometimes obtaining, deductions from their rents on the score of snow-storms, disrepair of steel-yards, dis- appointments in law-suits, &c. &c. Such claims necessarily expose the trustees to much annoyance, by occasioning meetings for the purpose of discussing the alleged losses, and often lead to differ- ences of opinion on the subject amongst the trustees themselves. A practice prevails in some districts of the kingdom of licensing the toll-houses as public-houses, in order to obtain a higher rent from the tacksmen on account of their emoluments from the sale of spiri- tuous liquors. To the honour of the trustees and her Majesty’s jus- tices in the counties of Fife and Kinross, this practice is scarcely known — there being in these counties comparatively few instances of toll-house ale-houses, and these in localities where, from the absence of any other houses of refreshment, the thing is permitted as absolutely unavoidable. The trustees of the Dunfermline district in 1841 had the offer of £88 for the North Queensferry toll-bar, on the condition that the tacksman should be allowed a publican’s license ; if not, he was to get a deduction of £35, reckoned by him as what would be his probable emolument from the sale of spirituous liquors. His license was refused — the trustees wisely sacrificing £35 rather than open their toll-house as a tippling shop. This is an example worthy of imitation. Farm servants going or coming with their masters’ carts are the principal persons who entertain themselves at the toll ale-houses. The toll-keeper is duly licensed ; the men must stop at any rate to weigh their carts and pay their tolls, and when a halt is once made, why not do something for the good of the house ? — mine host, as toll-keepers go, being a very good fellow in his way, willing, as hosts should be, either to give or take a glass. The day is either so hot or so cold that it requires a dram ; or may be an acquaintance opportunely comes in the way, who dislikes a dry meeting. Those landlords who are road trustees and justices of the peace are, we think, bad economists who thus heighten the toll rents by the profits of spirituous liquors picked from the pockets of their own or their tenants’ servants. Then, toll-houses are often placed at the meetings of roads or upon inclined planes, or just at the bottom of the hill — in all which situa- tions the toll-gates are of themselves sufficiently inconvenient obstruc- tions. But adding to them a congregation of horses and carts, resting for an hour, or hours, with drivers whose malt may have got above their meal — inclined, it may be, to try their scientific powers a little in the fancy line — the evil is obviously one of a dangerous kind to other passengers and their horses and carriages. Nevertheless, both mail and stage coaches, and private carriages, must, under the toll- bar system, be content to thread their way through those unchancy labyrinths the best way they can. ROAD REFORM. 17 % When we consider the detention of servants at tolls where drink is sold, the enticement which is held out to dissipation, the numerous cases in which articles have been stolen from carts while the servants were over their cups, and the frequent instances of serious and fatal accidents which have happened by such obstruction of the road, as well as by the starting and running off of horses left without their drivers, we think that, if such evil things as toll-bars are to be con- tinued, the additional evil of allowing toll-keepers to hold ale licenses is one which the trustees and j ustices over the whole country ought, for the public benefit, to set their faces against at all hazards and at all risks. Soon after the publication of our former edition a bill was intro- duced into Parliament for putting a stop to the licensing of toll- houses ; and while these sheets are going through the press, the mea- sure has been re-introduced in the House of Lords under the auspices of the Duke of Richmond. This* point will now be fairly discussed, and authoritatively settled, we hope, in the proper way. It is now our duty to look to the expenditure of the £33,547, 7s., which we find has been levied during each of the years 1841, 1842, and 1843, from the lieges of Fife and Kinross shires under the road and bridge acts ; and as the best mode of showing how much has been applied in the repair of the roads and bridges, and how much in the expense of management, we submit the following table, from the twenty-eight abstracts of accounts : — TABLE II. Average Amount expended during 1841, 1842, and 1843, in the ordinary Repair of the Roads and Bridges of the Counties of Fife and Kinross, Great North Road, and Kinross and Alloa Road, and in Assessing and Collecting the Funds, and Managing the Roads and Bridges. ROAD REFORM. 19 The general result at which we arrive by the aid of the above tables may be stated shortly thus : — Sums annually levied in Fife and Kinross shires in name of statute labour, bridge money, and toll duties £33,547 7 0 Annually disposed of thus : — ]. In ordinary repair of roads and bridges— — — — £16,110 17 7 2. In expenses of management : — Emoluments of one hun- dred tacksmen and toll collectors, estimatedat 20 per cent, over their rents, or £37, 19s. Id. each £3795 11 5 Collectors of statute la- bour, bridge money, &c~ 208 2 4 Repair of toll-houses, &c~ 376 17 10 Roups of tolls 159 7 5 Clerks and treasurers 840 13 7 Surveyors ~ — 1268 14 7 Miscellaneous expenses — 412 2 4 7061 9 6 3. In payment of interest of debt — - 3939 1 0 4. In reduction of debt, &c. — 6435 18 11 £33,547 7 0 £33,547 7 0 On attending to the relative amount of the funds which are employed in the repair of the roads and bridges, and which are consumed in the expenses of management — £16,110, 17s. 7d., the annual average of the former, and £7,061, 9s. 6d., the annual average of the latter — we think he would be a bold man who would deny that the expense of manage- ment is disproportionally great compared with the sum expended in maintaining the roads and bridges. We must be understood, however, not as reflecting upon the officers employed by the trustees, for we believe no body of public officers could possibly conduct the affairs of their constituents with greater zeal and fidelity. We find fault not with the men but with the system — with the multiplied and expensive proceedings attendant upon working so many different local acts, and so many separate trusts — and with the costly mode of collecting the funds. It must be noticed, further, that there are several important items of expense which do not appear in the foregoing table, viz. : — 1. The cost of road legislation : 2. The law expenses incurred betwixt tacks- men and private parties in questions respecting tolls : 3. The loss arising from the toll-houses and gardens, and steelyards, not yielding any yearly return to the trustees. From as accurate information as we could obtain, the total debts affecting the above-mentioned roads amounted, at the end of 1840 (exclusive of old subscriptions, upon which no interest has been paid for many years, and which may be regarded as donations to the roads), to the sum of ... ... ... ... £116,972 6 0 Towards which, in the course of the three years, sums were paid, including treasurers’ balances, to the amount of ... ... ... ... ... ... 19,748 5 9 Leaving, at the end of 1843, a total debt of about £97,224 0 3 20 ROAD REFORM. Several of the twenty-eight trusts were then free from debt, while others were heavily loaded with it. The above-mentioned debt, how- ever, does not affect the trusts in cumulo — the debts as well as the funds being, under the existing system, kept separate. The debts are due to different sets of creditors, who rely upon the funds of the separate trusts, and personal security where they have such, for the payment of interest, and the ultimate payment of the principal sums. Large as the debt is, it is inconsiderable when compared with the great extent of excellent and valuable roads, of the expense of making which it is the reversion. These measure 394 -|- 483 — in all 877 miles : making the debt upon them less than £110 per mile. It is highly satisfactory to learn from the accounts, that for a number of years by- past there has been a considerable annual reduction of the debts af- fecting the trusts through the excess of income over expenditure. This is going on progressively, and, in the course of not many years, even under the present costly and complicated system, would clear off the debt altogether, and that slowly or quickly according to the finan- cial state of each trust. Such a state of matters as that which shows, upon the above-men- tioned data, that the expense of collection and management is equal to nearly 44 per cent, of the whole expenditure on the roads themselves — and which, we believe, is not the case in our counties only, but may be found throughout road trusts generally— strongly demands a remedy ; and one of a twofold nature, and, as we think, well worthy of con- sideration, presents itself. That remedy is — (1) An abolition of turn- pike tolls and statute labour and bridge assessments, and the substi- tution of an annual rate upon horses ; and — (2) A simplification or consolidation of the present numerous trusts into a limited number. I. — CONSOLIDATION. The advantages which result from the simplification or consolidation of contiguous road trusts are so well known that very little seems necessary to be said on this point. Instead of having eight-and- twenty trusts in full operation in the two counties, with complete staffs of officers, it would obviously be better to have only a limited number, under which the whole business could be managed, and managed not less efficiently than by the present system. The idea of simplifying or consolidating road trusts is by no means a new one : it has been beneficially acted on in many cases. Among these, it may be noticed, that the Fife turnpike roads in the Cupar district were, till a very recent date (1841), conducted in fifteen separate trusts, with separate accounts of income and expenditure, and separate debts constituted by separate bonds. But by arrangements effected by the trustees under the powers granted to them by the Fife turn- pike act, these fifteen trusts have been consolidated, and the whole income and expenditure have been placed in one account under one management, much to the ease and convenience of the trustees them- selves, and of the officers of the trust, and certainly at a great saving of expense of bonds and bills — there being now only one aggregate debt, which is rapidly wearing off, instead of about fifteen separate EOAD REFORM. 21 «&ebts, with a corresponding number of different parties to deal with, and a corresponding complexity in all the transactions of the trust. A debt such as that which Fife and Kinross shires labour under would, in like manner, be much easier managed as a whole than when divided, as at present, into numerous fragments, each having a body of separate creditors requiring to be tr'eated in different ways — the creditors in trusts where the funds are strong readily taking 3J or 4 per cent., and those in a weak trust, which has the most need of care- ful nursing, exacting 5 per cent, because of the greater risk. Now, however well entitled to liberal interest are the lenders of money to trustees under temporary acts of Parliament (such as road acts of thirty-one years), we apprehend that were the road funds of the two counties consolidated under legislative authority, and loans ap- plied for and assignations of the funds offered in security, there would be no difficulty in dealing with the present creditors, or other monied parties for the sum required, at the current rate of interest, to rise or fall according to the money market. Railways readily borrow on their debentures at 3J or 4 per cent., and an assignment of the road funds, in security of the interest of loans, would be not less freely accepted. When no more than 3 per cent, can be got in the public funds, we should think that capitalists would gladly lend at 3J on such an un- doubted security as we have referred to — the entire annual road funds of the two counties. In the South Wales trust, as we shall after- wards see, the sum needful to pay off the creditors was borrowed from the Public Works Loan Commissioners ; but we think the consolida- tion might easily be effected throughout the Scottish counties, and the whole road creditors paid, or their debts amply secured, in the way we have suggested, without drawing one penny from the public trea- sury. According to tlie present law, road trustees are hampered by the creditors in every proposal to reduce the tolls assigned in security, as this can only be done upon the consent of three-fourths of the credi- tors in value being obtained. Such parties — often unconnected with the localities, and wholly ignorant of the bearings of the matter — re- ceive proposals of the nature referred to with great suspicion, and their answer not unfrequently is, “ If you mean to lessen our security, pay us our money.” Loans might be taken under the authority of Parliament — some of them for a term of years, others of them for shorter periods — to ad- mit of the gradual liquidation of the debt from an annual surplus fund, which, under any system, should be provided, besides interest, repair of roads and bridges, an allowance for improvements, and the expense of management. In many of the twenty-eight trusts there are floating balances — some of them in bank at two or three per cent., others of them in the hands of treasurers and trustees at no per cent. — which, were they con- centrated, would clear off several thousand pounds of debt, and stop so much interest at 3 J or 4 or 5 per cent. In the fifteen bank accounts of the trusts of the Cupar district, previous to the consolidation, there were usually scattered a couple of thousand pounds, and that sum, upon the consolidation, was at once applied in reduction of so much debt — thereby stopping a heavy annual sum of interest, and also, so far as the amount paid off was concerned, stopping the costly ma- chinery attendant on the transfer of securities. 22 ROAD REFORM. In consolidating road trusts, objections are often started by those in the management of such of them as have the good fortune to be free of debt. Such parties feel disinclined to be associated in any way with trusts in less prosperous circumstances. But the public good which will accrue from having only one set of creditors and one set of managers, instead of a multiplicity of different sets, should, upon reflection, reconcile them to a consolidation. It is not enough that several lines of road in a county or in a district are in good condition , all the roads should be equally attended to as part of the same pub- lic interest. It is clearly both the interest and the duty of the strong to support the weak, as the prosperity of the one will be reflected on the other. Take the case of two parallel roads under separate trusts, the one with a heavy debt and the other with a light one. The trustees of the latter reduce their tolls, which those of the former cannot afford to do. They must keep them up at the highest rates sanctioned by the act. The consequence is obvious : the traffic shifts on to the cheap road, and wears it much beyond its due proportion, while the insolvent road, with its prohibitory tolls, is used only by those unfortunate parties who are locally chained to it. By this the intercourse of the district is prejudicially hampered, the road is starved, and probably its creditors too. But however unavoidable were the circumstances that led to the constitution of so many separate and dften conflicting road trusts, we think the time has now arrived when, without prejudice to any party, all the public roads in each county — their debts as well as their funds — may with perfect propriety be regarded and dealt with as one common concern. In the matter of consolidation, the latest and best precedent is the statute of 1844, 7 and 8 Viet., c. 91, passed with a view to remedy the Welsh toll grievances, intitutled “ An act to consolidate and amend the laws relating to turnpike trusts in South Wales,” and part of the preamble of which bears, “ that the several trusts in each of the (six) respective counties then existing should be consolidated and placed under uniform management and controul.” The first step in effecting a consolidation, is to take an account of the debts upon each of the trusts to be embraced in it, and to set a fair value on the subscriptions or debts due upon such trusts as are in insolvent circumstances. Then where, as in the case of the two counties referred to, other counties — Perth and Clackmannan — are concerned in the management and debts of certain of the roads, it would be necessary to determine in what manner, and according to what proportions, the debts outstanding upon such trusts shall be apportioned and made chargeable upon the counties of Fife and Kin- ross on the one hand, and on the counties of Perth and Clackmannan on the other. This was done in the matter of the South Wales trusts by commissioners appointed by the Treasury under the following powers in the act of 1844, sec. 9 : — rvnqnhnr 80 201 Anstruther Easter ; 44 Kilrenny — ..... ... - 137 Anstruther Wester .. Cameron 38 202 Kingsbarns .. J (ar^o 146 „ 269 Carnbfifi .241 TiAnrdinr« 322 Crail . .241 Npvvbnrn . 90 Denino .... , 107 Pittenwf* p m . . ... ...... 61 Elie . 78 St Andrews . 490 Ferry-Port-on- Craig Foro-an 49 IRQ St Leonards ... 24 Total in St Andrews D: [STRICT 3062 * In our former edition we attempted to distinguish the horses in two classes— employed in agri- culture, employed otherwise— but in this there was much difficulty and inaccuracy, owing to the mixed employment of a large number of the horses. We now state them without attempt at classification. 74 ROAD REFORM. III. FIFE-KIRKALDY DISTRICT. In Abbotshall parish — Auchterderran 173 255 In Kinghorn parish ... Kinglassie - 213 234 Auchtertool 63 TC’irk-qbly 158 Ballingry .. . 108 Leslie --- 195 Burntisland 180 Markin ch 471 Dysart 189 Scoonie .. ...188 Ivennoway 144 Wemyss . .142 Total in Kirkaldy District.. 2708 IY. FIFE— DUNFERMLINE DISTRICT. In Aberdour parish ..188 Beath _140 Carnock 122 Dalgetty . .. 113 In Dunfermline parish 694 Inverkeithing 176 Saline 215 T orryburn . 1 1 2 Total in Dunfermline District . . 1760 Y. KINROSS-SHIRE. Arngask parish (part of) Cleish 39 64 Forsrandenny ( part of) .. 4 to J v Jr J Fossoway 105 Total in Kinross-shire. In Kinross parish . 240 Orwell 231 Portmoak 158 ABSTRACT. In Fife— C upar district ... ... 3094 St Andrews district . 3062 Kirkaldy district 2708 Dunfermline districts. 1760 Total — , — ...10,624 In Kinross-shire 841 Horses returned as at work in the two Counties — * 11,465 The total number thus ascertained is 11,465 horses. But, consider- able as this may appear, we have the strongest reasons for believing that it falls below the real amount, and that an authorised survey by a paid officer would give a return of several hundreds more. Sup- posing the omissions to be only five per cent., this would add 573, and give a total of 12,038 ; and we have no doubt that this number at the least is annually at work within the counties of Fife and Kin- ross. We would impose a rate equal to one-fourth of the horse rate upon all other beasts employed in drawing or carrying, small poneys and donkeys included. These we compute at 200. Besides the produce of the rate on the horses and on these lesser animals, we have to dispose of the annual value of the toll-houses, ROAD REFORM. 75 gardens, and steelyards. These in Fife and Kinross shires (exclusive of small lodges or collection boxes) number as follows : — Fife- Toll-houses. __ 14 Steelvards. 13 St Andrews dck, 17 17 Kirkaldy do 11 10 Dunfermline General do 7 7 Whitehill 1 Aberdour and Duloch 1 Leven road 5 4 Kinross-shire turnpikes 14 10 Great North Road 6 6 Kinross and Alloa Road 2 0 78* 69 According to valuations with which we have been favoured by the road-surveyors, the highest of the toll-houses, garden included, is worth £250 ; the lowest £20. The steelyards are estimated at from £4 to £25 a-piece. The small lodges or collection boxes, of which there are a goodly number, and such of the toll-gates as are of iron, may be worth in all £50. These data give the following aggregate : — 78 toll-houses at £50 average^ £3,900 69 steelyards at £12 828 Small properties and iron gates 50 £4.778 If these subjects, after standing many of them for years, are worth so much at this moment — as we believe they are — we may fairly con- clude that, in their original construction and annual repair, they have cost the road funds more than twice as much, or, in round numbers, £10,000. The house and garden for the collector at Cupar south toll, erected 1842, cost nearly £300, though not greater than required for the accommodation of a small family. In those counties, such as Forfar, where the toll-houses are constructed on a large and hand- some scale, to serve both as public-houses and dwelling-houses, the cost and present value will be considerably greater than the Fife toll-houses. Most of the houses are commodious and substantial, with gardens corresponding, and nearly all of them are in the very choicest situations — the entries to towns and the junctions of roads, where property is of value, and can be readily sold or let to advan- tage. Were they converted into money, they would take off so much debt, and diminish the interest accordingly. We think, however that, instead of selling them, it would be more profitable to retain all, or nearly all, of the toll-houses and steelyards, and to let them annually for behoof of the roads. Or it might be convenient to give a certain number of them at the principal points as residences for the county constabulary. It would be a deprivation to the public were the steelyards with- drawn, as they are trusted to by all classes for weighing much of the farm and mineral produce supplied to our towns and villages, and shipped at our ports. This suggests the idea, that the toll-houses * Several have since been added in the St Andrews district, and one in the Kirkaldy district, at Burntisland— the latter a very small affair truly. 76 ROAD REFORM. and gardens, with the adjoining steelyards, should be let to indivi- duals who would undertake to wait upon the public, and be at their service, in weighing carts at a small fee, as the toll-keepers heretofore have been. Such would be a comfortable home and an easy employ- ment to persons advanced in years, by which they might, after paying a rent, clear a few pounds to themselves. We have a steelyard in our eye which was erected by an enterpris- ing joint-stock company, consisting of forty individuals, with a paid- up capital of 10s. each (£20) ; and they readily let their steelyard, without house of any kind, at £5 a-year, being a return of 25 per cent on their capital. The steelyard referred to is at a minor port, where there is little traffic, yet it once brought upon competition so much as £10 a-year of rent. It has now for several years past steadily produced a rent of £5. Presuming that the tacksman there, through the fees drawn by him, has a fair remuneration for his trouble over and above his rent, we think that the toll-houses, gar- dens, and steelyards, throughout the two counties, would, if let in the way suggested, bring an average rent of £5 — the tenants to be bound to uphold the fabric of the toll-houses and the steelyards in proper working order, and at all times to be ready to serve the public in weighing. The retaining of these properties will have this recommendation in the eyes of those who have an affection for the toll-bar system, and who dread a failure in our plan, that, should their fears be realised, all the means and appliances will be ready, on the shortest notice, for the resumption of their favourite system in its accustomed rigour. To meet the £16,222, 16s. 3d. annually required in the two coun- ties for maintenance of roads and bridges, annuity for redemption of debt in thirty years, and expense of management, a rate of 27s. 6d. per horse — supposing a uniform rate to be the advisable one — would suffice. Thus — 12,038 horses at 27s. 6d £15,950 7 0 200 poneys and donkeys, at a quarter rate .. — 68 15 0 60 toll-houses, gardens, and steelyards, let at £5 each 300 0 0 t 18 do. for the constabulary, at 5s. each 4 10 0 £16,323 12 0 Sum required. ' 16,222 16 3 Surplus — _ £100 15 9 Of this rate there would be — For maintenance of roads, about.. — .... ..... — ...~.£0 19 6 per horse. For redemption of debt ... 0 5 6 „ For management ... 0 2 6 „ In all £1 7 6 per horse In this way the management would cost only a twelfth part, or 8k per cent., instead of 44 per cent, as at present. The debt upon the roads of the two counties is a heavy down- draught on our plan, being equal, as we have just noted, to about 5s. 6d. on each horse. There it is, however, and we see no better or fairer mode of getting quit of it than by laying it on the horse-rate, and spreading the burden over a period of years. The precise same- tiling was done in the case of the South Wales trusts ; the only diffe- ROAD REFORM. 77 rence being, that there the fund for redemption was to be raised at toll-gates. In either way the debt must fall upon the owners and users of horses ; and if we are right in saying that our plan is an infinitely cheaper mode of collecting road funds than by the toll-bar system, there can be no question that it is the right one, and should be adopted. Scarcely anything can be more galling to a county than to have a heavy road debt hanging upon them, generation after generation — every one shaking his head and lamenting that such a thing is, but none taking any effective step to bring it to a termination. Changes frequently occur in the rate of interest, and new bargains must be driven with the creditors for a rise or fall ; loans are called up, and new ones must be sought ; there must be new transfers, and new bonds and bills and assignments, the very expenses of which make a debt of themselves ; — all, sometime or other, to be paid out of the tolls or road funds levied from the public. Such being the position of matters, it is surely highly desirable, even at some sacrifice to individuals, that arrangements should be made for clearing off the debt ; and certainly we look upon the owners of horses who are to enjoy the roads during the next thirty years as the most fitting parties to bear the burden. A few farmers in an adjoining county have demurred to this part of our scheme, because they had nothing to say in the creation of the debt. V ery true they had not; neither had the great majority of those other parties on whom the horse-rate will fall. None of them incurred either responsi- bility or trouble in the borrowing the money, or in expending it, or in making the many and excellent roads which we have now on every hand. But, under the present system, to which these parties appear blindly to cling, they, as part of the public, must nevertheless bear their share of the debt ; and, in objecting to a cheap and certain mode of clearing it off, they are just perpetuating the burden upon them- selves and others, and standing very much in their own light. The farmers referred to affect to consider the plan advocated by us as specially directed against them and the influential body to which they belong ; but a moment’s consideration will show that our plan is a comprehensive one, not for any particular class, but embracing all classes and all persons who own and use horses. These farmers also affect to consider the horse-rate as to be saddled on them individually for the next thirty years. It is true the farmer will have to pay in the first instance, but then he will charge the road money against the profits of his farm, in the same way as he charges his present tolls and statute labour, or his smith’s and wright’s ac- count, and seed and servants’ wages, or any other unavoidable ex- penditure. In such instances — and we believe they will be few — where the rate will be more than the farmer’s present tolls and sta- tute labour put together, then he will have it in his power to correct that in taking his next tack, by giving so much less for his farm. This is not a farmer’s question but a landlord’s question, as upon him ultimately must fall the road money payable for his lands, according to the number of horses necessary for their cultivation. Undoubtedly at this moment the farmer’s road tolls and statute labour, servants’ wages, &c. &c., are all as much burdens on the land as the land-tax and county rates, or anything else chargeable directly against the landlord. There is this in the horse-rate, however, that 78 ROAD REFORM. if any tenant shall keep more horses than absolutely necessary for the purposes of his farm, then so far the charge will fall upon him- self. In the case of large estates, with one-half of the farms on the wrong side of the toll-bar, there must, as respects that half, be a difference of some shillings per acre, because of the tenants being unable to move unless on payment of a smart toll ; but do away the toll-bar, and at the next let the rents of the whole estate will be equalised, and if the one-half require a reduction because of the horse-rate being higher than their former statute labour and tolls, the other half, from being freed of the toll, will be well able to make up for it. In this, and indeed in every aspect in which our proposition can be viewed, we think it will be found to simplify the management of pro- perty, and to emancipate us from our present artificial state in the matter of public thoroughfares. In the view now taken by us, the rate for the counties of Fife and Kinross will be 27s. 6d. per horse. If the estimate on which we have proceeded be in any respect wrong, the rate will of course vary accord- ingly. If more or less compensation-money shall be got from rail- ways than assumed by us, then for every £100 of variation there will be a variation of £5, 5s. -yearly on the 'dead weight. We would make the same remark as regards the expense of keeping up the roads. Were our estimate, for example, to vary from the truth to the extent of £600 yearly, then there would be a similar variation in the amount of the fund required equal to Is. per horse. It matters not, however, in our view, what the rate might be in any particular county. We hold by this principle, that, wherever the toll-bar system is in operation, the roads are supported by the owners of horses, and that these parties as a whole, as well as in the great majority of individual cases, would be cheaper to commute their tolls and statute labour by a rate on horses, than to suffer as they do at present both pecuniarly and otherwise. Supposing £30,000 required under the present system, we are pretty certain that in the general case £20,000 or less will answer under our system, making a direct saving to those parties to the extent of one-third of their present payments. They should not be too ready, therefore, to clamour against our plan on the ground that some of them will have greater nr less relief by it than others. It is offered as a beneficial arrange- ment for all parties, in prefence to the present condemned system. Whatever the rate in any county may at first be it will have a downward tendency, owing to the progressive increase in the number of horses. The satisfactory progress everywhere making in agricultural im- provement — the extent of yearly drainage — the successful application of new manures — and the enterprise which is at work in this branch of national industry — is bringing every year additional land into cul- tivation ; so giving more labour to the horse, and consequently in- creasing the numbers of this useful animal. The railways are giving an immense impetus to travelling and to commerce, requiring indeed a large stud of horses at every station. Then the abolition of tolls would cause infinitely more driving, and more driving infers more horses. At present we are in an artificial state. The toll-gates bound the drives of many, whether for business or for pleasure. Once re- ROAD REFORM. 79 move them — once throw the roads open — and we shall see public and private vehicles of every description flying over the length and breadth of the land. We shall be no longer disgracefully barren of cross public convey- ances between one town and another, and between one village and another. Each locality will have its stage-coach, or omnibus, or fly. At this moment the toll-tax on a daily two-horse coach, running an ordinary eight or nine mile stage, with one gate as it leaves the one town and another as it enters the other, usually pays 2s. going and the same returning, being 24s. a week, or £62, 8s. per annum. This sum the coach proprietor must realise over and above the mileage, the keep of horses, and tear and wear of coach. Again and again has such a project been tried between places pretty numerously peopled, and with every prospect of success. But again and again, owing to the high fares necessary to meet the high toll, has the project been aban- doned as a ruinous concern, and the locality left without any public conveyance — the former impassable gulf, as it were, still between them. What an unfortunate state of matters ! According to our plan, the rate upon the horses for the coach — four in number (two to do the work each alternate day) — would be only £6, making an annual sav- ing to the coach proprietor and the public, in the item of tolls or road money, to the extent of £56, 8s. Casting one’s eye along the march betwixt Fife and Perthshires, we look in vain for any coach communication between them. The dis- tance betwixt Cupar and Perth, the capitals of two counties, is only twenty-one miles, yet not one single coach. The four tolls which ob- struct the road have to answer for this. They force a traveller going from Cupar to Perth round by the ferry at Dundee and the Carse of (xowrie. Neither is there any public conveyance from the capital of Fife to the capital of Kinross-shire. The four tolls on that road of nineteen miles have to answer for this. Persons going between these towns must either hire a special conveyance or take coach to Burnt- island, so doubling the distance. Neither is there any public convey- ance betwixt the east and the west of Fife. The flourishing manu- facturing town of Dunfermline desires very much to have free inter- course with the “ lang toun ” of Kirkaldy. That, however, will not do, because the twelve short miles which separate them are obstructed by three tolls. For the same reason there is no regular conveyance on the road betwixt Cupar and Newburgh — 11 miles and two tolls ; Cupar and St Andrews — 9 miles, 2 tolls ; Cupar and Elie — 13 miles, 3 tolls ; Cupar and Largo — 9 miles, 2 tolls ; Cupar and Leven — 10 miles, 2 tolls. These, but for the excessive tolls, would all soon be- come better acquainted with each other. So would all towns, which, through the blighting toll-bar system, are practically cut off from each other. Coaching on toll roads only pays betwixt very populous towns, as the high fares consequent on the tolls preclude the mass of the community from ever presuming to set foot in a coach ; and so long as such conveyances are mulcted in heavy tolls going and coming, they cannot thrive nor be at all accessible to the general public. To allow free communication betwixt neighbouring towns, an abolition of road tolls is imperiously demanded, let the substitute for them be what it may. 80 ROAD REFORM. Those who can patiently look forward to the end of the thirty years will see that, when that happy period arriyes, the rate per horse will at once fall 5s. 6d. — that is from 27s. 6d. to 22s. — the whole debt being then cleared off. In the meantime we must here grapple with a rate of 27s. 6d. upon each horse. To many of those who pay statute labour and bridge money, and an unknown amount of tolls — having, in fact, their hands scarcely ever out of their pockets — the rate proposed to be charged, and to be paid in one sum, may at first sight appear large. But we should think that a computation of the various charges now falling upon them in a variety of forms under the present system will convince them that a great relief would be afforded under the one now pro- posed. In Fife, owners and occupiers of land, as we have already seen, are burdened with the statute labour assessment — a tax equal in many cases to 18s. or 20s. per horse ; and over and above, they must pay tolls for the turnpike roads the same as if they paid not one farthing of that assessment. The assessment is exacted annually from the heritors at or immediately after the 25th March, and they again ap- portion and collect the same from among their tenants along with their rents— the very time when tenants are apt to consider all extra payments peculiarly vexatious. The Kinross-shire farmers, as already mentioned, do not pay quite so heavy a rate of statute labour assessment as the Fife farmers. But then the Kinross-shire tolls are higher than the Fife ones ; and the tolls on the Great North Boad, which is their way to the markets of Perth on the north and Edinburgh on the south, are higher still. Between Kinross-shire and the city of Perth they pay three tolls on the Great North Boad — Damhead, Bridge of Earn pontage, and Friarton ; and between Kinross town and Burntisland or Queensferry they have other three — Gairney, Crossgates, and Burntisland or In- verkeithing. The rates of these tolls are — For a cart of sixteen cwt., fourpence ; twenty cwt., sixpence ; twenty-two cwt., eightpence ; twenty-five cwt., ninepence. By the Fife turnpike act this latter ■would be only fourpence. Then on the Great North Boad, when a cart weighs thirty cwt. — an ordinary load for a good road — the toll is one shilling and twopence. The toll rises twopence per cwt. the length of forty cwt. (making a forty cwt. cart pay 2s. 10d.), and above forty the toll is a prohibitory one of one shilling per cwt. The statute labour and tolls payable by the Kinross-shire farmers may, therefore, be held to be on a par with those payable by the Fife farmers — both suffering alike. All such parties, then, whether of the one county or the other, should, we think, lend a favourable ear to our proposition for pay- ment of 27s. 6d. per horse as in full of all burdens whatever leviable from them for a year’s free and unrestricted use of the whole roads, at all times and at all seasons, and with every kind of conveyance — horse, cart, dog-cart, gig, carriage, &c. — and without detention to men or horse, either refreshing where the toll-houses have the double debt to pay, and are also ale-houses, or in getting carts weighed at steel-yards, procuring or showing tickets, disputing about exemptions, &c. Farmers are in the practice of contracting with their blacksmith for BOAD EEFOBM. 81 shoeing their horses at so much a pair per annum. Some are also in the practice of contracting with the saddler for keeping up their plough and cart harness. Others, again, have yearly contracts with wrights for re- pairing their carts, and ploughs, and harrows. They find it cheaper and better to have everything about their horses and carts kept in good order upon a yearly contract, than to run up bills for the different items, and have long accounts to settle with the tradesmen at the end of the year. Those parties who have tried and benefitted by such contracts will, we should think, lend a favourable ear to our plan. It would save them from putting their hands in their pockets every time they had to send away their carts, and it would save them also from count and reckoning with their servants as to the number of tolls they had paid and the weights charged. It would also prevent such a thing as the taking the master’s horses a considerable round to evade the toll, and yet charging the master as if they had gone the direct road and paid it. If it be advantageous to the farmer to have a contract for the free run of the blacksmith’s, and saddler’s, and wright’s shops, at so much a year per horse, we think it would be not les9 advantageous to him to have a cheap contract — a moderate horse rate — for the free run of the roads. Tenantry seeking information anent farms in the market are, accord- ing to the present system, obliged to make enquiries about the certain amounts of statute labour assessment, and the uncertain amounts of tolls likely to fall upon them. A candidate for a farm, though an excellent judge of the capability of its soil, may be — often is — wholly unacquainted with the toll-gates which lie betwixt him and his markets, manure, & c. He, therefore, as a slump thing, estimates £10 for his ten horses’ statute labour, and £10 for tolls ; but to his loss he finds the latter just £10 under the mark, which, in a nineteen years’ tack, is a drawback to him approaching to £200. Again, even could he form a true estimate of what the existing gates would cost him, he might not have the wisdom to foresee that scarcely would he be set down in his farm when a toll-gate would be placed by his side, under which he must smart throughout the whole tack. A fixed annual rate per horse would remedj’’ all such evils, and inform the tenantry of the precise amount of the road money which would fall upon them. A fixed rate would be equally of service to many — if not to all — other classes. The baker, the brewer, the bleacher — in short, every one en- tering upon business involving carting upon public roads — could do so with much more comfort and safety did he know beforehand what the yearly use of the roads would cost him. He would set down so much for interest on capital, rent of premises, expense of establishment, and his own remuneration — to which, instead of guessing at his tolls, and pro- bably miscalculating grossly, he could add with certainty the exact sum which a year’s use of the roads by his so many horses would stand him. To all such parties, as well as to the man of moderate income and the professional man, an annual fixed rate — be it more or less — would be an unspeakable boon. Toll-gates abolished, farmers would be no longer under any restriction in driving manure — dung, lime, bone-dust, and guano ; or in driving tiles and stones for drainage, now so extensively practised by our enter- prising agriculturists ; or stones or wood for enclosing their lands, or materials for building or repairing steadings — in entering on all which concerns it is well known that the first question usually put is, How F 82 EOAD EEFOEM. many tolls have we to pay ? Where the table of tolls is adhered to, as it should be, the improvement generally stands still ; where the statute is violated and a less toll accepted the improvement goes on. What an ab- surdity to have the improvement of the country under the control of the toll-keepers ! According to our plan, farmers would not be under any restriction in carrying their produce to the best market, and bringing back whatever suited them, or in going, though it were a few miles farther, to some cheap or favourite lime-work or coal-pit. Their horses once on the road and no toll interfering, they would take whatever benefit offered, either through cheapness or superior quality, or any other inducement, and thus freely supply themselves with the necessaries referred to, and indeed with all those numerous articles which they must daily require. When delivering grain, a farmer might then, without dread of return tolls, bring back manure, or coal, or anything the place could supply to him. At present he is restrained from doing so by the toll exigible on each new loading. The manure, at three or four shillings for a good cart, might be very tempting, but add eightpence or a shilling for toll — - that is several pounds per acre — the thing will not do at all. The farmer rather trusts to getting a few stacks for straw at some neighbouring roup ; but there the waygoing tenant is so well liked, and has so many friends helping his sale, that he is obliged to pay two prices for the straw. His only consolation is that none of his money has gone into the toll- keeper’s pocket. A system which has the practical effect of preventing the farmer from bringing home, as well as from taking away — a system which gives a positive premium for returning with unladen horses and empty carts — is surely a bad one. Our plan would permit agriculturists free access to exchange the pro- duce of the earth with each other — to attend all the markets and agricul- tural societies’ meetings within their reach — to see their different farms frequently — and to interchange visits with their friends, far and near. Profit and instruction would arise from such intercourse, and from the facilities that would thus be afforded of their personally marking and making themselves acquainted with the progress of improvement in the different parts of the country. Parties then would no longer have occasion to drive illegal bargains with toll-keepers for getting through their gates at lower rates than the authorised tolls. There is much inducement to this both to private persons and to toll-keepers because of the severity of the tolls. The toll of ninepence upon a gig, for instance, makes the folk of Fife try every expedient to break down the charge. The visitors of the weekly markets deem ninepence for a gig -little short of imposition. They therefore propose that the toll-keeper should accept sixpence, instead of the full toll. In this they mix themselves up in a transaction by which, under section 55 of the General Turnpike Act, any tacksman taking less than the full toll is declared to be liable to “ forfeit and pay any sum not exceeding £5” for every such offence. The toll-keeper shakes his head at the proposal, and pleads the act, and insists upon the nine- pence. Next week our visitor makes an effort and walks to market, or he may come on horseback, leaving the lady and the family parcels at home, at a charge of twopence, which the toll-keeper takes sulkily. This repeated once or twice has the desired effect ; the toll-keeper gives in, and agrees thankfully to pass the gig, as often as he pleases, at sixpence — both he and the passenger thus committing a fraud on the act, of ROAD REFORM. 83 course on the honourable understanding that the toll-keeper is not to be informed on and spunged of the £5, to which' undoubtedly he had thus subjected himself. The toll-keeper referred to probably flits at next term, a new man comes, and with him again must this paltry contest be renewed, till he in turn knocks under and takes the sixpence. Many ingenious devices have been practised by the lieges in eluding the toll-keeper, or, as he views it, in defrauding him ; and with many, such is their estimation of the toll-bar system, the accomplishment of a feat of this kind is reckoned almost a cardinal virtue. When not pos- sible to cheat him out and out, it is thought good to slice a-half or a-third from his legal toll. One excellent help to this is to have a statute labour road at hand, by which, though two or three miles round, the toll-gate may be avoided. Then say to the toll-keeper, either take a nominal toil or the carts will be driven the long road : the toll-keeper shuts his eyes to acts of Parliament and to his tables of tolls, and takes what he can get. An excellent help, too — a paradoxical one indeed — is to be placed be- tween two toll-gates which clear each other, and which are by the trus- tees’ arrangements set to two different tacksmen. It is then quite beauti- ful to play off the one against the other. Those having to drive south try the toll-keeper with sixpence for their gig, telling him that his prede- cessor never took more. But the toll-keeper assumes high ground ; dis- claims his predecessor’s rule, and exacts the full ninepence. Next day the same party bargains with the north toll-keeper to pass his gig for six- pence ; he gets a ticket, drives through this gate a few yards, then turns about, and instead of parleying with the south toll-keeper, pops the barren ticket into his hand and whips on. This repeated once or twice, the ninepenny toll-keeper discovers the trick, and is fain to beg the traveller not to take the trouble of sending his gig through his antagonist’s toll- gate, but to come freely south at sixpence, acknowledging, with much humility, his stupidity in not having taken the sixpence from the first. Under the present system our agriculturists are taxed for their grass lands for the support of the roads by the statute labour assessment upon them. But by the proposed system grass lands would be exempted from paying road money, and for this plain reason, that grass lands do not use the roads. The exemption from statute labour assessment would enable the grass proprietor to let his parks so much the cheaper. Occupiers of such lands having horses, either for breaking them up or for improving them in draining or fencing, would of course be obliged to pay the rate. Cattle — cows, oxen, calves, sheep — all of which we find rigidly taxed under the present toll-bar system — would now pass free, probably not a great saving to the farmer, but still a saving, in going to and from graz- ing lands and markets. Were our plan adopted generally, and tolls and statute labour assess- ments abolished from one end of Scotland to the other — which we strenu- ously recommend, and earnestly hope to see effected — a Fife farmer in sending a lot of cattle or sheep to the great mart of Glasgow, through the intervening counties, would save the ten or twelve toll-gates which pre- sently obstruct his course, equal to about a shilling a-head on his beasts. The freedom of grass lands and of cattle from contributions to the road funds, either in statute labour or tolls, would operate as an encourage- ment to the farmer in resting his lands, and also as an encouragement to the breeding and rearing of cattle — of which, notwithstanding the admis- sion of foreign cattle under the tariff of 1842, there is a scanty supply. His fields, when broken up, would yield so much more white and green 84 ROAD REFORM. crop to each horse’s labour, according as they had been well laid down and rested, and he would have a more plentiful supply of grass* both for horses and cattle, and a cheaper supply too. It may be suggested, also, as matter of consideration for the farmer, that, besides the privilege which the proposed system would confer di- rectly on himself in passing his carts and horses to and fro without pay- ment of a heavy, almost a prohibitory toll, he would indirectly profit by corn-merchants, cattle-dealers, stablers, butchers, and others, requiring farm produce, coming freely to him. They would no longer be deterred from inspecting, and pricing, and buying, and driving away his excel- lent stock, dead and alive, by the heavy expense of tolls. Those parties could then drive about at their pleasure, going here and calling there, wherever there was anything to sell ; and in turn the farmer could deliver grain, hay, potatoes, and other heavy produce, almost without expense. At present the active and public-spirited corn-merchants who frequent the markets of Fife are severely taxed for tolls on their gigs — one house, we believe, to the extent probably of thirty or forty pounds a-year, in at- tending the markets of Kirkaldy, Cupar, St Andrews, Newburgh, and Perth. Were those heavy toll-taxes on corn-merchants and dealers and distillers done away, the farmers individually would reap the benefit, at least a great part of it. Lessen the expense of travelling the round of the markets weekly, and there will be more merchants — more competi- tors for the farmer’s produce. Only make the roads free for payment of a moderate annual rate per horse, and the farmer will not be under any restraint as to the market he should go to, or the length of his drive, in selling and making delivery to his merchants. It is possible there may be individual farmers who are so situated that, excepting their statute labour tax, they contribute very little to the road revenue because of their having access from their farms, by some statute labour road or untolled turnpike, to port, market, and mill, as yet free from tolls. Those parties, however, who have heretofore escaped from bearing their fair share are not entitled to object to being now made to pay what is right. They should have been paying all along like others for the support of the public roads ; and if they will cling to the toll-bar system, they must have applied to them the principle wisely recommended to the St Andrews district, of putting on additional tolls to catch the traffic, and this will soon find those parties out. The toll-bar will at last reach them to their cost, and they will then begrudge themselves that they have given even a passive support to so expensive a mode of raising the road funds, and be ready to join in crying out for a change which would make their one shilling go as far as two. This argument we would urge upon all who, from the defective state of our toll-bar system, have hitherto escaped from such a disagreeable neighbour as a toll-bar. They may rest assured that, either in the one way or the other — either by the toll-bar system at an enormous expense of collection, or by our plan at a very trivial cost — they must make up their minds to pay. If economy be their object, they will cheerfully go along with us. In the parishes of Logie, Kilmany, and Leuchars, in Fife, many farmers have access to the ports of Balmerino and Guard Bridge, and to the market-town of Cupar, and to corn-mills, without paying any toll whatever. None of them, however, are missed by the statute la- bour assessment, and most of them have also a considerable amount of toll to pay in sending their produce to other quarters. They have HOAD REFORM. 85 lime and coal to drive from the interior of the county ; they have weekly tolls for their gigs in going to the markets of Dundee, St Andrews, and Newburgh. They find freedom from tolls in certain quarters an apparent ease to them, but it has its disadvantages. To escape the toll-gates they sometimes use bad and circuitous roads. Then, when a dealer knows that they can deliver to him free of toll, he just offers them so much less price, saying they may as well give the bargain to him as go to his antagonist upon the toll-road, and put the difference into the toll-keeper’s pocket. Many a transaction, dis- advantageous to the farmer, has arisen from this apparently trivial cause. It has often stopped him from going to the best market with his produce, and stopped merchants from coming to him. Some light has been thrown on what would be the expense to the farmer under our plan, as compared with his present statute labour and tolls, by a committee of the Fife road trustees, recently appointed to consider the propriety of changing the system of levying road money. The convener of the committee, Major Anderson, called for returns from a number of the leading agriculturists in the different districts of the county of their statute labour and tolls and number of horses, and received returns from twenty-nine individuals, having among them three hundred and sixty-four horses, and paying yearly of statute labour and of tolls, according to their computation, £690, Os. 6d., equal to £1, 17s. lOd. per horse. At twenty-seven shillings and sixpence per horse, these parties, in the gross, would save £186, 4s., or about .27 per cent. Going into their individual cases, we find twenty-two of them paying more than that rate, and seven of them less, viz. : — 22 having 286 horses — £603, 16s. Id., or £2, 2s. 2d. per horse ; and 7 having 78 horses — £86, 4s. 5d., or £1, 2s. Id. per horse. We question much whether in these cases the full amount of tolls has been stated, as few people keep exact accounts of their toll disburse- ments by themselves and their servants throughout the year. If all correct, then those seven at the 22s. Id. average must be situated in districts which the toll-bar system has not yet fully reached, or in places nearly free from tolls by having statute labour roads to pass the toll-gates. Were there no toll-gates, however, the driving of the parties referred to would not be confined within their present toll- bar bounds, but would be greatly extended and increased. But taking the returns as they stand, more than three-fourths would obviously be great gainers by the change, while less than one-fourth would be affected the other way, and that only to a small extent. Many of the latter class, however, take an enlarged view ; looking to the manifold advantages of free and unfettered road communication, they would accept our plan, confident that the beneficial nature of its operation would greatly counterbalance any little extra charge which, in the first instance, there might be in individual cases. Those concerned in coal, lime, and iron works, brick and tile works, and quarries of every description, would find immense advantage from the abolition of the toll-bar system. The public are restrained from resorting freely to such works by the expense of the tolls. Frequently a field cannot be limed and drained, nor buildings erected, nor a dyke . built, because of two or three intervening tolls. The coal consumption of the towns and villages would be much 86 ROAD REFORM. greater, were the inhabitants not compelled, by the expense of the foils, to do with a scanty supply of fuel. A ton of third Scotch coal can sometimes be had for half-a-crown ; but before getting to the colliery for it, one or more toll-gates must be paid, probably to the ex- tent of another half-crown, so doubling the price to the purchaser, and frightening him from again trying that otherwise inviting colliery. In this way farmers, who would economise their horses by substituting steam for horse thrashing-mills, are often thwarted in their intentions, not so much by the price of the coal at the pit, as by the tolls upon the cartage, which are increased according to the weights. The importance of free access to coal-fields is of the utmost con- sequence to inland manufacturing towns and villages. These labour under great disadvantages ; and when blockaded with tolls, as is too often the case, the dearth of coal — that all-essential article in the pro- duction of steam-power — absolutely paralyzes the industry of the in- habitants. The road tolls on the coal are a heavy discouragement to the increase of manufactures — indeed to the use of steam-power gene- rally — and a consequent loss to the communities alluded to, as well as to the trade and commerce of the country at large. Minerals form an important item of the wealth of Great Britain, and any system by which- they could be rendered more easily accessible would be obviously advantageous to their proprietors, to their tenants, and to the public. Unrestricted access to all such works would un- doubtedly augment the demands upon them, and afford lucrative em- ployment to additional numbers of the labouring population. Coach proprietors upon thorough lines who hold up against the toll-bar system, and the public through them, can speak from sad ex- perience of its oppressive nature. Each horse in a daily coach costs from eight to ten pounds of toll annually. Suppose there are two sets of horses, and that the stages are from six to nine miles, with only one gate per stage, each set goes and comes every alternate day, paying in Fife sixpence per horse going and the same returning ; that is one shilling every second day per horse. In a daily mail-coach each horse at this rate costs £9, 2s. 6d. of toll yearly. In an ordinary stage-coach, which does not run on Sundays, the annual toll per horse is £7, 16s. 6d. This leads us to the important question, Whether, supposing the general principle of our plan — a rate upon horses — were assented to, it would be right to have one uniform rate applicable to all horses however employed, or to have a scale of rates according to their kind of work ? It is no doubt true that coach proprietors and carriers take greater use of the roads than the other classes, and they would probably willingly submit to pay two or even three rates for their horses. It might then, with apparent reason, be proposed that horses used in coaches and in carrying should pay three rates ; horses used in car- riages and gigs, two rates ; and other horses, including agricultural, one rate. Whether a scale be adopted, or whether a uniform rate be adopted, is a matter of detail, and does not affect the general princi- ple of our plan, which simply is, that road money should be raised by a rate upon horses, and not by statute labour assessments and tolls collected at toll-gates. ROAD REFORM. 87 Uniformity of rate would certainly tend much to the easy working of our plan. There would not be any restraint upon running horses in coaches, or carriages, or gigs, or letting them to hire, by the fear of having to pay an extra rate. There would be no cavilling in the ap- peal courts about the class under which they should be rated — whether, having merely lent one to supply a jaded coach-horse for a few days, the owner should be liable for three rates ; or whether, having just tried him in an old gig one day, when going to dine with a friend, to see how the animal would do, that should make him liable for two rates. All such vexatious questions would be avoided by making the rate a uniform one. A scale of rates would often prevent the horse-owners from making an advantageous use of their property. They might have a tempting offer for a horse to run in a gig for a few days, or a few weeks, but then the putting it to that work would incur tha double road rate. They therefore refuse the job. Uniformity of rate would permit — nay, encourage — the owner to employ his horse wherever and how- ever he could ; the rate must be paid, and better have him on the road, though but moderately recompensed, than have him eating his head off in the stable. Again : Were there different rates, the higher ones would not be so productive as at first sight might be supposed. The coach-horses em- ployed in the counties of Fife and Kinross do not amount to any con- siderable number. The roads upon which the principal coach traffic occurs are the Great North Road and the Great Road through Fife — extending in the two counties, the one to 29f- miles, and the other to 34. The ordinary complement for a daily four-horse coach is one horse per mile ; and there being usually six or feeven coaches upon the two roads, the number of horses so employed may be from three to four hundred. But the services of coach-horses on these roads will very soon be dispensed with by the railways. The cross-coaching will likely be increased, but still no sum of any large amount can be counted on as certain to be realised by making coach-horses pay three rates instead of one. A heavy direct tax of that kind, added to the mileage and assessed taxes laid upon coach proprietors, would greatly discourage the running of cross coaches, which are so much wanted. Supposing, however, that a few extra hundreds could be laid on the coaching interest by a triple rate, they again would of necessity take the amount out of the public in one shape or other. It would be their best apology for an extra coach fare — a thing which the public at large are interested in preventing. The fewer the burdens on coach proprietors, the less capital will be required for their business — the greater will be the competition, and consequently the cheaper the fares. The public, and not the coach proprietors or carriers, would reap all the advantage of having a moderate road rate upon horses in public conveyances. The encouraging of those conveyances, by allowing them to run at cheaper tolls than private vehicles, has been recognised for a number of years past in different parts of the kingdom. The Fife turnpike trustees granted an ease of one-third upon coach tolls— that is to say, they reduced the coach toll from ninepence per horse to sixpence, while the toll upon horses in private vehicles, carriages, and gigs, has been kept up at the full rate of ninepence. In other parts of the 88 ROAD REFORM. kingdom, public coaches are allowed to pass at one-half of the ordi- nary toll ; and in some instances the trustees make the toll upon public conveyances in their localities almost nominal ; so well con- vinced are they of the sound policy of lessening the expenses of those engaged in supplying public conveyances. A system of different rates would not be all gain to the farmer, because, under it, were gig-horses rated double, he would have to pay accordingly for his gig-horse. The extra charge on this animal would just about equal the reduction there might be on his other horses, so making the thing as broad as it is long. A scale would embarrass the working of our plan, and create an- noyance to individuals in questioning them as to their use of their horses, and in tempting them to return them as liable only to the lower rates. A diversity of rates would not be a perceptible gain to any class. In this country we have many interests blended together which forbid the dealing with one class in one way and another in a different way. In the same person we often find united the coach proprietor and farmer — the carrier and farmer — the professional man and fanner — the manufacturer and farmer ; so that, in many cases, the imposing of different rates would just take out of one pocket what it put into the other. Those who advocate different rates for different descriptions of horses — for instance, a lower rate for the farmer’s horse than the manufacturer’s — should beware of pitting one class of the community against another. Surely we have had enough of that already. Wit- ness the heartburnings attendant on the corn-laws ; witness the dis- content throughout the Scottish burghs at their prison assessments being higher than in the counties. Wherever such inequalities exist we may expect to be embroiled in discord and contention until the ground of complaint be removed. We can suppose strong cases — horses employed in a coal-pit or on a horse railway, animals which set not a foot on a highway ; these we would nevertheless rate the same as others. Though they do not use the roads at all, their owners will have their recompense in the vast additional traffic which will immediately open up to their works on the abolition of our present restrictive system of toll-gates. The fact of much or little use of the roads being taken by the horses of any individual should not be the question. Were such a principle admitted, then an individual who uses his assessed carriage, or horses, or dogs, only on rare occasions, might plead off from being charged the same public taxes as those who are always driving, or riding, or hunting. So one who only throws open his drawing-room on state occasions — say for his annual marriage-day party — might plead off from the charge for a full year’s use of the windows of that part of his house. Or an elderly person, who makes it a rule never to cross his threshold after sunset, might object to paying one farthing of the lighting assessment of the town in which he lives. The answer to all such arguments is, that the assessed taxes are imposed, for the good of the state, on all persons possessed of the articles referred to, however little they use them ; and that the lighting contributes to the benefit of the town, whether the objector profit personally by it or not. If he do not avail himself of it in going out of an evening to see others, it will enable others to come and see him : so, indirectly^ ROAD REFORM. 89 he will have the benefit of the lighting, as will the owners of horses have benefit from free roads, though, in some cases, not directly by their own horses. After all the consideration w r e have been able to give the matter, we decidedly incline to the opinion that the rate should be a uniform one, and that all horses, however employed, should pay alike. We would not have any individual asked how he uses his horses — whether in coaches, or carriages, or upon farms, or at coal or lime-works, or in carrying. Those desirous of starting carriages or gigs would do so all the more readily because of their horses not having to pay a double road rate. Such parties pay assessed taxes for their horses, and for ser- vants, and it would be bad policy to discourage them from taking the road, in good style by charging a double road rate upon their carriage and gig horses. The more carriages and gigs at work, the more de- mand for the farmer’s hay and corn, and the more employment for the coachbuilder and blacksmith. Those keeping posting establishments would make their charges for post-horses and carriages to cover the road rate in the same way as they now make their charges to cover the mileage duty. The addi- tional charge would be very small, as, supposing the rate so much as 30s., it would only be three half-pence per day per horse. Supposing post-horses out every second day, threepence added to each hire would cover the road rate. This would be as nothing compared with the present costly toll-gates, which are seldom far distant from posting stations. Having no longer any dread of tolls and toll-gates, the traveller would not be under any restraint respecting the road he should go, or when or by what road he should return. The humbler class of hirers — the common carters — would require three halfpence a-day additional from their employers to cover the rate. They would, assuredly, profit by the change. Were road tolls no more, carters would be much oftener on the road than they now are. There would be more commissions for them in all directions than are now dreamt of. We would find many carting themselves to visit their relatives, and watering-places, and see sights, who must now stay at home, and but very seldom get beyond the smoke-range of the town. It is true, they say, that horses are often a sort of idle, and can be hired on easy terms, but then these tolls cost money. Emancipate the roads from the tolls, and the people would enjoy free- dom of motion. Under the plan proposed by us, we do not presume to say that in- dividual cases will not occur where the uniform rate may exceed or fall below the amount it properly should be, as special inequalities are to be found in the operation of every general tax. The inequali- ties, however, never can approximate to those of the present system, under which grass lands pay a heavy amount of statute labour, though they use not the roads at all ; some pay tolls for using only one hun- dred yards of road, while their neighbours, for a similar payment — sometimes without any payment — have the use of ten, twelve, or fifteen miles of road ; and others, again, in particular situations, con- trive to carry on their business almost toll-free. The only classes of horses we w r ould exempt from the rate, besides those in her Majesty’s service, are the young stock which have never been put to work, and those superannuated servants which have done 90 ROAD REFORM. their duty well in their time, and, after a life of toil and active exer- tion, are, through the kind consideration of their owners, allowed to eat out the evening of their days in peace and plenty. The plan of a uniform penny rate on all letters, which is now working so admirably throughout the three kingdoms, was, when brought forward by Mr Rowland Hill, much objected to, because of the inequality of making a three-mile letter pay the same as a letter carried three hundred miles. But experience has proved that the pro- posal to have 'different rates for different distances was most wisely re- jected. Through the operation of the penny post the correspondence of the country has increased nearly threefold ; and we confidently anticipate a corresponding increase in the locomotion of persons whenever toll-bar obstructions shall be done aw*ay. On the princi- ple of the penny post, we would humbly urge a uniform road rate on all classes of horses — however much or however little they may be upon the public roads. A friendly counsellor has suggested to us that our argument does not hold here, because, though half-ounce letters go for a penny, those of higher weights pay twopence, fourpence, &c. ; and from this he in- fers that coach and carriers’ horses should pay more than others, be- cause oftener on the road. But, with all deference, our argument holds completely. An ordinary letter pays a penny, while the double, or ounce letter, costs twopence. So one horse suffices for an ordinary load, but if the load be a double one, then there must be two horses — paying, of course, a double rate. The single horse, like the penny letter, is equal to a certain weight and no more ; when that is exceeded, additional strength must be supplied and additional rates paid. By the post-office, as now regulated, we can have our thoughts carried from one end or one side of the three kingdoms to the other, at a penny per half-ounce. It would be not less advantageous to have the power of cheaply transporting our persons hither and thither by untolled coaches. • Among those to whom we would particularly appeal for support to our plan are the landed proprietors. These gentlemen are most deeply interested in every measure which concerns the prosperity of the coun- try, and this is one which we believe comes as closely home to them as almost any can possibly do. They have the trouble, as we have seen, of advancing the statute labour assessments for their tenants, and of apportioning and re-collecting them. They have also the ex- pense of paying what is called bridge money— a small tax, but still a tax. The resident proprietors — happily a very numerous class in this kingdom — moreover, have their tolls to pay. These proprietors, and all others who have given the slightest attention to the operation of the toll-bar system, must, we doubt not, have observed at their own doors many defects, and imperfections, and iniquities in it, which have either not occurred within our observation, or to which in the compass of our limits we have been unable even to allude. It is evident that, although the tenant’s statute labour assessment and his tolls come directly out of his pocket, and may be called a tax upon him, yet in substance and in reality his statute labour and tolls are an indirect tax on the landlord. Barring these, the tenant would have given just so many more pounds of rent. Whatever, therefore, ROAD REFORM. 91 has a tendency to 'lighten the tenant’s road money will, in the same degree, lighten the burden on the landlord. He is thus, both by self- interest and by the desire which he must feel for the welfare of all around him, very deeply concerned in any measure which would re- duce and equalise the expense of maintaining the public roads. Our plan, we think, would have some effect in improving the breed of horses, as it would be an object to have good and strong animals, and make four suffice for what at present is the work of five. If, in the general case, the adoption of our plan would be a saving to counties of about forty-four per cent. — nay, even if the saving shall promise to be of much less amount — we would claim the cordial coun- tenance and co-operation of the landed interest. If, indeed, in some instances, tenants, who at present have access to ports and markets by statute labour roads free of tolls, would not be directly relieved by the change proposed, still, even in such cases, and without reference to toll-gates which may be imposed upon them, we would ask the fa- vourable consideration of their landlords, on the ground that the mea- sure will unquestionably be of advantage to the country generally. If it be true that the statute labour assessments, and bridge money, and tolls, levied from the counties of Fife and Kinross on the average of years, according to the present system, exceed thirty thousand pounds yearly, and that, according to our plan, the comparatively small sum of sixteen or seventeen thousand pounds will be amply suffi- cient — then we hold that wq have made out a strong case for a statu- tory enactment to carry out such a measure as we have proposed — and our desire is to see it tried as a substitute for road tolls where- ever they exist. IV.— GENERAL REMARKS. The expense of road tolls prevents commercial men from visit- ing the smaller towns throughout the country — so depriving those places of the full amount of mercantile competition of which otherwise they would have the benefit. We now see comparatively few commer- cial gigs on the roads. The great bulk of mercantile men content themselves with doing what business they can on the lines of the rail- ways and coach roads, and leave the local merchants and dealers to supply themselves the best way they may. Under our system all mercantile men would be at full liberty to make their rounds in their gigs without any toll, and to call at every town, and village, and store, where they could sell a single parcel of their commodities. Supposing the county of Fife were to father this measure, and to succeed in procuring an act of Parliament for applying it to itself alone, while other counties choose to remain in their present toll bondage, we have no doubt that our plan would operate beneficially, though not to the extent that it otherwise would do. Any county which supports its roads by a rate upon its own horses, and gives them without charge to all and sundry who will come and take the use of them, is very likely to have numerous visitors, not only in the way of business but in the way of pleasure. Those coming with their horses and gigs twice a-year, and spending a fortnight each time, in making the round of the county, calling on their customers in the different towns, would have a month’s use of the roads for nothing ; and how much would this be had they to pay their share of the rate for that 92 ROAD REFORM. time ? Why, only half-a-crown, where the rate is thirty shillings for the whole year. Daring the month they would spend some thirty pounds of good ready money among our innkeepers and stablers — from which they and the farmers who supply the hay and corn, and the provision dealers, will have very greatly more than the half-crown of profit. A county without tolls would induce families to resort to it for sum- mer residences or bathing quarters, particularly those who were smart- ing under the toll-bar system of their own county. They would de- light in the varied scenery and the refreshing breezes all the more that they could enjoy these blessings toll-free. Though such families would have their use of the roads with their carriages and pairs, or their gigs and dog-carts, for three or six months, and which, by a strict account- ing, should make them liable for a fourth or a half of the horse-rate, still we think the profit which would arise upon their articles of con- sumption would, as in the case previously supposed, much over-balance their proportion of the rate. A county with emancipated roads would tempt many not merely to make temporary visits, but to form per- manent residences, and become valuable additions both to its wealth and its population. Their horses would then be rated like those of others. On passing from a county where their every movement was trammelled by toll-gate upon toll-gate into one delivered from these grievous and hateful restrictions, they would feel a delightful sensa- tion approaching to that of the dark son of Africa when, escaped from the yoke of his taskmaster, he first sets foot on the free soil of Britain. The post-office is exempted from paying road tolls upon mail-gigs and two-horse mail-coaches, but it pays for four-liorse mail-coaches. Of these latter, which are of considerable annual amount, the post- office revenue would be disburdened under our system, and the officers of that great establishment w r ould be relieved of all their trouble in periodically receiving, checking, and paying the demands made upon them for such tolls. The tolls so paid by the post-office for the year 1843, according to the finance accounts presented to the HouseTof Commons, and ordered to be printed, 26th March 1844, amounted for Great Britain to the sum of £17,353, 4s.— a considerable draft cer- tainly on the penny letter revenue. In paying tolls upon four-horse mail-coaches, the post-office insist that these shall not be at a higher rate than the tolls upon stage- coaches passing through the same gates. But road trustees, when keeping by the letter of this regulation, sometimes break it in spirit. There is an instance in the west of Scotland, where there are two parallel roads leading betwixt two towns eighteen miles apart, and where there is one toll at the junction of the roads, and other four tolls — two on the one road and two on the other. The mail runs upon the shorter line, and is charged for three tolls at the full rate ; the other coaches run by the longer line — diverging, indeed, a mile to avoid one of the mail toll-gates ; yet, though passing through three gates, these coaches are charged toll only at the gate on the junction road. In consequence, the stage-coacli fares are a very trifle. Were the stage-coaches to run upon the mail road, then they must either pay full toll like the mail (which would stop them), or the mail toll must be reduced to the rate exacted from them. Neither of these alternatives would answer; and because the post-office is a broad ROAD REFORM. 93 board, and can afford to pay, the trustees keep the mail-coach tolls at the highest pitch, to enable them to let ordinary coaches pass two of the three gates free. Such are the equivocal expedients sometimes taken to ease the cost of tolls on public coaches. But while we would save the post-office revenue from being cut down by any road toll charges, and while we would place the burden of maintaining the roads on the owners of horses, these parties would be well entitled to be relieved of all, or at least of a portion, of the taxes upon their horses and carriages. If the owners of horses main- tain the public roads, and not for their own purposes alone but for the horses and carriages of her Majesty and of the State, and for pedestrians of every grade, down to the boys with their hoops, then we humbly think they do all that should be required of them, and that, as regards horse and carriage taxes, they should be very tenderly dealt with. The assessed taxes on horses used in riding and drawing carriages amounted for the year 1843 to £376,001, 18s. 4d. — a large sum of public revenue to meddle with, but still some part of it should be yielded. We would most earnestly contend for the abolition of the present progressive scale by which persons are assessed for their horses used in riding or drawing carriages at from £1, 8s. 9s. to £3, 6s. each, according to the number kept. An individual having only one such horse pays £1, 8s. 9d. If he extend his establishment by an addi- tional horse, this costs him for the second horse no less than £3, 5s. 9d., making for the two £4, 14s. 6d. A person who keeps three horses is charged £2, 12s. 3d. on each, making for the three £7, 16s. 9d. If he have a turn-out to the standard number of four, the rate is then increased to £2, 15s. per head, or £11 for the four. The scale thus rises, on and on. When he gets the length of ten the charge is £3, 3s. 6d. per head, or £31, 15s. for the ten ; and if he is so much a friend to the employment of grooms and stable boys, and to the consumption of hay and corn, as to have a stud of twenty, they are rated at £3, 6s. each, or £66 in all. A uniform rate of £1, 8s. 9d. would for the twenty be only £28, 15s. Instead of discouraging parties from increasing their establishments by a rising progressive scale of this kind, we would rather put them upon a decreasing scale, in the same way as we find, in the assessed tax schedule, the butcher’s first horse rated at £1, 8s. 9d., but his second at only 10s. 6d. The doing away with assessed taxes on riding and carriage horses, or even reducing them to a moderate uniform rate, would lead to the immediate increase of the number of horses employed for such pur- poses. This would be another ease to our road rate, and but very little loss to the public revenne. Persons setting up or extending their establishments would require additional servants, and there would be a corresponding increase in the consumption by those families of all sorts of taxed articles. Every opportunity should be seized to encourage the expenditure of the rich in these and all other beneficial ways by modifying the direct taxes. These often deter in- dividuals from assuming that style of elegance and grandeur to which their rank and fortune fairly entitle them, and by doing which they would the more share their wealth with the numerous classes below them, to whom, in all their movements and in all their splendour, 94 ROAD REFORM. they are furnishing employment and wages ; acting really, as Burke well said the rich must do, as stewards for the poor. In speaking of a reduction of a class of direct taxes, we are aware that we are treading upon ground which is not in the least new, and for that reason we would have avoided tho topic altogether but for its immediate bearing on the main question which we are handling. If there must be public taxes on horses used in riding and drawing carriages, we only wish that they should be at one and the same rate upon all horses, in the same way as we would have a uniform rate upon horses for road money ; and that by no means should persons be discouraged from having two, ten, or twenty horses, by a pro- gressive increase in the tax corresponding to the number kept by them. Connected with the taxes on travellers is the gig-tax of £3, 5s. This is easily avoided by using vehicles under £21 of cost, and painting the owners’ names upon them. The restriction of cost is not very pleasant or profitable to the coachbuilders ; neither is the display of the name at all times agreeable to the traveller, unless he be a pro- fessional man desirous of advertising himself. It often limits the using of such articles. A clerical friend of ours once lent his gig, with name emblazoned, to a neighbour for a short jaunt. Soon after- wards he was accused by several friends in the quarter where his gig had gone of having been there without visiting them. He assured them they were mistaken, which, however, they refused to believe, as- serting that in point of fact his very gig had been seen at such and such inn doors. He felt scandalised at being so taunted, and though one of the most obliging of men, would never lend his gig and his name again. This system of low-priced gigs, with the names upon them, is not at all relished ; and we have often heard it suggested that a uniform rate of twenty shillings on gigs and dog-carts, of what- ever value, would be both more agreeable to those using them, and more productive to the Exchequer. Among others, there is a most important consideration upon which we would urge the abolition of the present system of toll-gates, and a modification of the public taxes on horses used in riding or draw- ing. We allude to the defence which is necessary for the welfare of the country at large against the extraordinary and almost overwhelm- ing power of the railway system. Railways are universally admitted to be of the highest utility. It was most desirable that the great towns of London and Manchester and Liverpool should be put in immediate connection with each other by those rapid means of transit. It was not less desirable that Edinburgh and Glasgow should be also linked together by railway. These great works have been accom- plished, much to the advantage of their proprietors, and much also to the advantage of the public. Similar works have been projected and executed between a number of other leading points in the three kingdoms, and at this moment the table of the House of Commons is loaded with bills for many additional lines, north, east, south, and west. The encouragement which the existing railways have received from all classes of society, from her Majesty down to the humblest traveller, makes it perfectly evident that, far as this system has al- ready advanced, it is in truth yet but in its infancy in these kingdoms, ROAD REFORM. 95 and that day Is not distant when we shall see every road which can in the least be called a trunk line superseded by the triumphant rail- way — when the railway shall make its way through the blue hills of Caledonia as far north as John-o’-G-roat’s House, exultingly exclaim- ing— Veni, vidi, vici. But while all this is going on — while those immediately on the borders of railways are drinking deeply of their advantages — what is to become of the parts of the country which the railways do not pene- trate ? They will be little other than mere stagnant pools, never moved by the breath of trade, but drying up and disappearing under the all-absorbing influence of the great railway leviathan. The balance will be inevitably cast in favour of those towns and districts which are connected together by railway lines, and against the other portions of the country which depend solely upon the old-fashioned communications of turnpike and statute labour roads. Mr Canning called the New World into existence, as he expressed it, to redress the balance of the Old ; and it is not less necessary, recognising the same principle in smaller matters, to raise up a wholesome rivalry to the gigantic and daily increasing power of the railways. This is to be done by throwing open the roads — that is, by abolishing the vex- atious system of tolls upon them, and also by abolishing as far as possible the assessed taxes upon horses, so as not merely to give the freest use of the roads, but also the freest use of the animals by which only, apart from steam power, these roads can be effectually traversed. Measures of this kind would, where railways do not immediately exist, facilitate not only ingress and egress betwixt one town and another, and betwixt inland districts and shipping ports which have the sea for their railway, but also betwixt such towns and districts and the stations of the railways which may happen to be nearest them. They would, by admitting frequent runs of coaches at very reduced fares, put the most remote parts of the country in easy and rapid com- munication, either with sea-port or with railway, -and enliven the agri- culture and trade and commerce of all of them to an extent hitherto unknown. Such measures would have a beneficial effect in two different ways ; they would place road communication betwixt country towns and dis- tricts on a practicable and convenient footing, and they would at the same time be valuable feeders to the railways. At present it is matter of complaint by passengers set down at many railway stations through- out the country, that they have been whirled there, and then left to walk and carry bag and baggage to their destinations, probably a mile, or half-a-dozen miles, as the case may be. If they won’t or can’t walk, then their only remedy is to find a special conveyance for their internal transport, and all because, what with road tolls and taxes on coaching and posting, neither coach nor omnibus can keep the road. Public conveyances of this sort are very smartly taxed. Those who conduct them must take out certain annual licenses, and pay assessed taxes upon the carriages employed by them, besides taxes upon certain of their servants, and also duty upon each mile which their coaches or hired horses shall travel. By 5 and 6 Victoria, chap. 79, passed 5th August 1842, the annual 96 ROAD REFORM. license for every public coach is fixed at three pounds three shillings ; and a duty of three-halfpence per mile, according to the length of road the coach travels, is payable both going and coming — that is threepence per mile. The same act removed all restrictions on the number of passengers to be carried in these vehicles — the only requisite being sixteen inches of seat room for every passenger. This act both re- duced and simplified the licenses and duties which were previously payable upon public coaches under 2 and 3 Will. IV., chap. 120, passed August 16, 1832. This last-mentioned act, however, still regulates the licenses and duties payable upon posting establishments. Each license for letting horses is 7s. 6d., and a duty of three-halfpence per mile is payable for every mile the horse travels ; if for no greater distance than eight miles, the duty is one-fifth part of the hire (20 per cent.), or, in the option of the posting-master, Is. 9d. The taxes upon carriages kept for hire are — those with four wheels £3 ; those with two wheels the same. Here are ample charges on posting-masters, and which, one way or other, they must take out of their customers. We do not very well know what per centage these public taxes upon the year’s business of a posting establishment may amount to, but it is evidently heavy. When posting is Is. 6d. per mile, the hire of a chaise and pair for a ten mile stage is 15s. Of this 2s. 6d., or 16f per cent., goes to the public revenue for duty at three-halfpence per mile on each of the two horses for this distance. The public taxes drawn from posting establishments, counting taxes on the vehicles kept, and mileage and servants, probably do not fall much short of 20 per cent, on the gross amount of the hires. Take the case of a horse and gig hired for ten miles at ninepence, with two tolls, as in Fife, at ninepence each; the trip costs the traveller ... ... ... .. £0 9 0 Of which, for duty ten miles at ljd. ... £0 1 3 For tolls ... ... ... 0 16 F or the use of the horse and gig ... 063 0 9 0 Here, what between mileage and tolls, there is a downdraught on the traveller of about 33 per cent. While those who make use of the public roads suffer thus fearfully, railways are allowed to escape with comparative impunity — for their sole public tax consists of five per cent, upon the sums charged or re- ceived for the conveyance of passengers, and no more. The words of the act 5 and 6 Victoria, chap. 79 (5tli August 1842), are, “ For and in respect of all passengers conveyed for hire upon or along any rail- way, a duty at and after the rate of £5 for £100 upon all sums re- ceived or charged for the hire, fare, or conveyance of all such passen- gers.” No license is required by the railway companies for running their trains, and no taxes are payable by them for their guards, engine- men, stokers, or other servants. While, however, we point to the disadvantageous discrepancy which exists betwixt the taxes on road travelling and on railway travelling, we do not for one moment propose that the latter should be raised to the height of the former. Our whole desire is, that taxes on road travelling should be reduced, at least so as never to exceed the rail- way five per centage. ROAD REFORM. 97 The railway system, now set a-going in Scotland in good earnest, is putting road trustees everywhere on the alert to see how they can best protect the road revenue and road creditors. Wherever a railway station is made to serve any town or village at a little distance, then we find the trustees stepping forward and holding meetings, and giving orders for the erection of additional toll-houses and toll-gates and steelyards, that the growing traffic may not escape untolled. This excites opposition on the part of the railway company as well as on the part of the towns and villages which are to be separated from the stations by the new toll-gates. But let all these parties grumble as they may, the road trustees, under the present system of tolls, have no other alternative ; they must make good their point, and they erect the toll-gates in defiance of all opposition. New railway stations and new harbours, and new coal and lime and iron works, and new manufactories and public works — in short, everything which creates much traffic where there was little or none before, gives the road trustees something to do in the matter of new toll-houses and gates and steelyards. All we have already said in refer- ence to the expense which would be incurred in erecting toll-houses, and toll-gates, and steelyards upon statute labour roads, were they declared turnpike, and the toll-bar system made complete, might be repeated in reference to the toll-houses, toll-gates, and steelyards, which will be required throughout Scotland at the stations of the railways at pre- sent on the carpet. It would be well, therefore, before expending a large amount in such erections, and raising up many additional toll- keepers, that it were maturely considered, Whether a better system of providing road money than by toll-gates and toll-keepers may not be found ? and, Whether what we propose is not that better system ? Before the railway stations are opened — even from the moment ground is broken for the railway — the road trustees and the railway companies almost invariably come into collision. The first object of the contractors is to get materials by untolled roads : they will have two or three hundred hofses employed, day after day and week after w'eek, conveying waggon-loads along the public roads, keeping always free of toll-gates. Thus, the Edinburgh and Northern Railway Com- pany have for months past been engaged driving hundreds and thou- sands of tons of stones from Eerrybank quarry, near Cupar, for their extensive bridges and works at Kettle and New Inn — some six or eight miles along the turnpike road — without, however, contributing one farthing towards the support of the road, because of their not being any toll-gate to catch them. The trustees are, therefore, to seek indemnity from the company under a proviso in the Railways Consolidation Act obliging such companies to make good their tear and wear of the public roads : how much trouble and how much ex- pense will be incurred in such prosecutions, and how far they will be successful, remains to be seen. Under our system new toll-gates and new prosecutions would be quite unnecessary. Whether fifty or five hundred horses were brought into a county for any particular work, the surveyor would immediately have them in his list, and make them pay the road rate. It would be wrong to suggest the possibility of road trustees who have a favourite but deeply indebted line of road nearly parallel to a railway, trying to keep the traffic upon it by the erection of toll-gates on the cross roads, with smart rates, as a prohibition against vehicles G 98 ROAD REFORM. getting to the railway. If such things, however, have not actually been done with this design, railway companies at least have sometimes been almost persuaded that they were really so intended. Under our system nothing of the kind could ever take place. Instead of having any toll obstruction to prevent the public from getting at each and -every railway station, we would have the roads made free as air. The natural working of our system will lead parties to take the utmost possible use of the roads, and the more frequently they can make their way with their horses, loaded with live or dead cargoes, to the railway, the more to their profit, and the more also to the profit of the railways. The greater the gain in these ways to the parties re- ferred to, the greater also will be the ease to the roads ; because, the sooner that traffic of any kind can be transferred from the roads to the railways, so much the less will be the tear and wear on these roads, and consequently so much the less will be the expense of maintaining them. We -confidently anticipate a cordial concurrence in many of our suggestions, not only from railway proprietors, but from all who would ever make their way across the country to a railway from the interior of the country, or from a railway into the interior — in short, from the whole travelling public. If the access to and from railways is to be restricted by a continuance of our present system of road tolls, and by heavy taxes on horses used in riding and drawing carriages, public and private, then undoubtedly railways will be beneficial only to those towns and districts bordering upon their lines, while all be- yond will be thrown as it were fifty years behind. Those who are to bear the burden of maintaining the public roads — the owners of horses as we propose — have this strong claim on the consideration of the Legislature in the matter of horse taxes, that they will support these roads not for themselves alone, but for the entire mass of the community. They will have annual road rates to pay, but, unlike railway proprietors, they will not have any annual dividends to receive. Their recompence will be in the diminution of the road money under our plan, as compared with the insufferable -system of tolls and toll-gates — in the encouragement of agriculture — in the increase of trade and manufactures, of which facility in com- munication is the most powerful promoter — and, generally, in the benefit of the country, in which they, the horse owners, will well de- serve to be large participators. Wherever the aid of machinery is required, water is the cheapest and best power that we have. But it must be sought, generally speaking, in places remote from sea-ports, and then there is land carriage to the mills, and land carriage again to the market or shipping port. The expense of these transits for road tolls alone cuts deeply into the ad- vantages which would otherwise accrue from the employment of water- -power, and from having workmen at easier wages, because of cheaper houses and cheaper provisions in the country than in the town. Asa matter of sound policy, public works should be encouraged in rural districts, both because they bring the water-power to account and save consumption of coal, and because they draw the masses from the large towns, and give them good and healthful employment in the country. 1 1 is delightful to turn from the confined unwholesome closes in many manufacturing towns, with every room crowded from the sixteenth storey downwards, to a public work in a rural situation — every family ROAD REFORM. 99 with their comfortable cottage and garden spread out to the sun, such as we find in Fife at Mr Fergus’s extensive spinning and bleaching works at Prinlaws on the Leven, and at Mr Yool’s in Dura Den. Our plan has a peculiarity seldom to be met with in changes of any kind, and which is a strong recommendation in its favour. It is this : that no new machinery is required for carrying it into full and com- plete effect ; on the contrary, it is based on a sweeping reduction of existing machinery. We have already, often enough perhaps, rung in the ears of our readers that we are to do away at once and for ever with tolls, toll-gates, and toll-keepers, the disappearance of all which from the face of the country will not, we believe, cause any deep pub- lic regret. Our plan farther embraces a consolidation of trusts, a re- duction of the number of officers, and an abolition of assessors and collectors of statute labour and of bridge money. The whole business of these toll-keepers, assessors, and collectors, would, as already ex- plained, be performed by those already existing officers — the survey- ors and collectors of public taxes. Chambers’’ s Journal tells us : — u According to returns to Parliament, the length of the turnpike roads in Eng- land and Wales in 1829 was 19,798 miles, and in Scotland 3666; making a total of 23,464 miles. At the same period, the length of all the other roads was 1 16,000 miles ; making the entire length of the public highways and byways at least 139j000 miles. In England and Wales, the number of turnpike gates was 4871 ; the debts on the roads amounted to £7,304,803 ; and the current expenditure on alt the roads for one year was £1,455,291. In Scotland, the debts were £1,495,082, and the expenditure £181,028.” * The same talented writer, speaking of the management of this vast machine, remarks : — “ There are ten thousand parishes in England ; but as many are small, and unite for road business with adjoining parishes, it is believed that there are not more than seven thousand boards of management, each with proper functionaries paid for attending to the condition of the highways. To this seven thousand are to be added the trusts appointed by the Legislature to manage the turnpikes. Of this class, in 1829, there were 1119, and the number of the acts of Parliament, which inspired them with life and vigour, was 3783. To keep the 19,798 miles of great roads in repair, required, we say, the apparatus of 1119 distinct trusts, 48/1 toll-bars, and 3783 acts of Parliament. According to this rate, a trust is required for every 17f miles, and an act of Parliament for every 5 and a fraction miles. As an act of Parliament generally costs £500, the turnpike roads of England and Wales may be said to have cost £100 per mile for legislation. The ratio is some- what different in Scotland. In that country, a trust seems to be required for every 9^ miles, and an act of Parliament for every 19 and a fraction miles ; which is at the rate of little more than £26 per mile for legislation.” Another Journal ,j in a recent article on tolls and post-horse duties, says there are not any statistics to determine what the number of toll- keepers in the two kingdoms may amount to, but by a rough calcula- tion they estimate that the number of men (not to talk of their wives and families) so employed must be something like 10,000, and these, with the value of the houses they live in, cannot cost the country less than half-a-million annually — that is fifty pounds a-piece on the ave- rage. It may be asked, Under whose management we would place the road funds — whether under the present bodies of trustees or under what other body ? In the local road acts almost every one of them * Chambers’s Edinburgh Journal, No. 68, April 19, 1845. f North British Railway and Shipping Journal, No. 29, April 18, 1846. 100 ROAD REFORM. appoints trustees possessing qualifications different from the others, embracing Lord-Lieutenants, Sheriffs and their Substitutes, Justices of Peace, Commissioners of Supply, proprietors of lands to the extent of £100 yearly, and their eldest sons, and the chief magistrates of burghs. All these parties may, with much advantage, be continued as trustees ; and in addition to them we would suggest farmers pay- ing a certain amount of rent — say £100, and generally all persons rated for a certain number of horses — say four and upwards. What- ever qualification might be adopted, we would have it uniform over all the country. Then, instead of the whole body of trustees of any county being called upon to meet and discuss details of road management, some- times to perpetrate jobs, they should be empowered, as in the South Wales road trusts under Sir James Graham’s act, to elect county roads boards, and to divide them into districts according to the requirements of the county. Upon these county boards we would devolve the election of officers and the entire management of the roads and road funds, much in the same way as the prisons act, 2 and 3 Victoria, chap. 42, devolves the management of prisons and prison funds in each county upon county prison boards elected annually by the Commissioners of Supply and Magistrates of burghs. We would, however, keep in the hands of the general body of trustees the impor- tant matter of fixing the rate to be imposed per horse — the rate once fixed to continue for three years, and then to be of new fixed by the general body of trustees for the next three years, and so on, upon the principle adopted in assessmentfor police purposes in the burghs under the burgh police act, 3 and 4 William IV., chap. 46. Borrowing further from the prisons act, we would have a general roads board sitting in Edinburgh, to see to the regularity of the pro- ceedings of the county boards, to arbitrate in cases of difference in any county as to the amount of rate to be imposed or the roads to be provided — whether there should be a road or bridge in a certain dis- trict ; and, if so, whether it should be of a first, second, or third class description. The assessors and collectors of public taxes would assess and collect the horse rate at the same time and in the same manner that they assess and collect the other public taxes — the collector to pay over the amount, less his commission, to the county roads bank account under the same regulations as he makes his payments of public taxes to the Receiver-General. In a county divided into dis- tricts, the proceeds of the rate should be allocated amongst them in proportion to the number of horses in each, reserving to general meetings to make a different arrangement should they in any instance deem such to be necessary. Commissioners should be named — the Sheriffs of counties for instance — to allocate those debts which affect roads in two or more counties ; and with power to strike out of the list of debts any old subscriptions which are irrecoverable. The road trustees should be empowered to continue for a time the loans from the present creditors, and pay them off gradually, so as to be clear at the end of thirty years ; or otherwise, to borrow money on annuities of that duration and pay off the present creditors. To protect the roads and road funds, we would prohibit any car- riages not drawn by animal power from running on the roads, unless by agreement with the county roads board. For the regulation of the roads in all the toll-bar counties of Scotland we would have one single act of Parliament. We would ROAD REFORM. 101 give plenary powers of altering the present lines of road, whether old highways or byways, or statute labour or turnpike roads, and of making new lines — the consent of the proprietors interested being first obtained. We would as seldom as possible go to Parliament for a special act to make a road improvement. To enable the trustees to provide for the expense of any new line that might be found necessary, they should have the power at their triennial meetings of increasing the horse rate so as to cover the expense. Suppose, for instance, that £1800 were necessary for such an improvement, then, where there were 12,000 horses, that sum would be produced in the three years by a single shilling added to the annual rate. This would be an easy way of accomplishing such an object compared with the present system of providing the expense of new roads by erecting toll-houses, and gates, and steelyards, and check-bars, and advertising and rouping the tolls, and giving the new toll-keepers a high remuneration. The act should require the accounts in each county to be made up by a given day annually — the Martinmas term ; and, after being audited and passed by the county roads board, they should be pub- lished for the information of all concerned for a certain period — say a calendar month — previous to the annual election of the county roads boards, as is done in the matter of municipal accounts previous to the better exercise to work on (provided his sight is good) than is presented in the following mysterious toll-ticket : — Bonnington Toll. 23d July 1844. 1 Carriage drawn by 1 horse, &c. load. Clears the following bars, viz. Drumseuch Wright’s houses Whitehouse checks grange loan hailes quarry cameron bank blinkbonny mayfield grange slateford and checks cairntowe drylaw dean checks stockbridge pitt street fair-mile -head bei- levue tynecastle claremont goldenacre crue comely bank dean park bonnington jock’s lodge trinity seafield braid-hills abbeyhill or marionville south- field niddry mill north leith leith links myreside morningside Or in the following specimen, of toll-bar geography in the west of Fife : — SPITTAL Toll Bar. July 1844 carriage drawn by Horse &c. Loaded. Clears — North Ferry. Inverkeithing Bridge, and check. Ladys mill and check. PittencriefT, Crossford, Rumblingwell and check. Gillander- son, and check. Crossgates, Towngreen, Buck- lyvie. In and around Edinburgh, as we spell the ticket, there are thirty-six of those obstructions to travelling which we would do away, and around the town of Dunfermline the disproportionate number of fifteen. If fifteen are needed for a provincial town — a very thriving one certainly — surely the capital of the kingdom must be scrimply served with thirty-six. Some toll-bars require two persons for night and day work ; but, grant- ing that one suffices for the toll-bars referred to, we have in these two localities so many as fifty-one families living on the toll-duties, and con- stantly on the outlook for the interest of themselves and of the road trustees — every one of them most watchfully taking care that neither horse, nor cart, nor carriage, shall pass his toll-bar untaxed. We are obliged farther to confess, that the demolition of the toll-houses, or their conversion to other uses, would deprive the youth sauntering along our roads of a great deal of fine out-door reading, combined with figuring, which they enjoy in the very copious painted tables of tolls that adorn the toll-houses, and which the toll-men are bound, under a penalty of five pounds, to give every facility in perusing to those who desire to imbibe a knowledge of the information therein contained. — General Turnpike Act, sec. 55. This reading, however, would be considerably more extensive if the road trustees had also been obliged — as they ought to be — to publish on the walls of the toll-houses a table of the exemptions vis-a-vis with the tables of tolls. These, which are by no means of the nature of what would be called light reading, would form perhaps fully as curious, and (to those whose pockets would be saved by them) a much more agreeable branch of the subject. The numerous grounds of exemption probably show more clearly than a volume of argument could do the extreme weakness of the present system of tolls. We enumerate those, allowed. 104 ROAD REFORM. by one clause of the General Scottish Turnpike Act : — No toll shall be taken — 1. For any horse or waggon, &c., employed in conveying road materials ; 2. Nor for any horse or carriage conveying implements of husbandry or farm produce from one part of any farm to another ; 3. Nor for any horses or cattle going to their usual pasture or watering- place, or to their usual smithy ; 4. Nor from any person going to his usual place of worship ; 5. Nor from any clergyman going to visit any sick parishioner, or on his other parochial duties within his parish ; 6. Nor from any person attending the funeral of any one who shall die and be buried within the parish ; 7. Nor for any horse or carriage employed in conveying the mails under the authority of the Postmaster-General, except where the carriage has more than two wheels ; 8. Nor for the horse of any officer or soldier on march or on duty : 9* Nor for any horse or waggon employed in conveying the arms or baggage of such officers or soldiers, or any sick, wounded, or disabled officers or soldiers ; 10. Nor for any waggon or horse employed in conveying public stores belonging to her Majesty, or for the use of her Majesty’s forces ; 11. Nor for any carriage conveying volunteer infantry, nor for any horse belopging to any corps of yeomanry in going to any place of exercise, inspection, or review, or on other military duty ; 12. Nor for any horse or carriage used by the officers of the road trustees when employed exclusively on the business of the road on which he is travelling; 13. Nor for any horses, cattle, or carriages, which shall not travel above one hundred yards on any road before or after passing any bar at which toll-duty is leviable for using the same. This voluminous catalogue of exemptions, which is swelled by many exemptions in local acts, is, for the protection of the tolls and the toll- keepers, closed by a stringent proviso, that if any person shall claim or take the benefit of any exemption not being entitled thereto, he shall forfeit and pay a sum not exceeding five pounds ; and in all cases the proof of exemption shall be upon the person claiming the same. The interpretation of the exemption clauses has, as will be seen from our Ap- pendix of Law Reports, occasioned a good deal of work to the courts. Our exemptions, however, as already stated, will be contained in a schedule short and simple as compared with the preceding catalogue. We would exempt from the rate, the horses of her Majesty and of the State — including those in the service of the army — and young stock and aged horses ; but none other. Very few if any questions could occur about exemptions ; and nearly all horses being subject to the rate, the rate would be kept low. It may be objected to our whole scheme, that though very promising in theory, the advantages anticipated from the throwing open the roads would not be realised in practice ; and we may be challenged to specify instances where such a measure has succeeded Here we are driven nearly to the wall, as under the long-continued system of adding toll- gate to toll-gate — the road trustees always taking care to trammel new traffic by new toll-bars — it is indeed difficult to find instances illustrative of the probable effect of our scheme. We can refer to one example, however, which in the strongest degree confirms the views we have urged. We allude to the great road from the city of Edinburgh to the town of Leith, commonly called Leith Walk. This road was included in the county of Edinburgh turnpike act 49 George III., cap 37, passed 12th May 1809, and by virtue of it a toll-bar was placed on the Walk at which a two-horse stage-coach * — then the usual public vehicle—* was to be charged various rates of ROAD REFORM. 105 toll, from one shilling to nine shillings each trip, according to the number of passengers. This toll-bar was continued on the Walk till the passing of the popu- lar act 5 and 6 William IV., cap. 68 (3d July 1835), which en- acted, that the tolls and duties authorised to be levied in the Leith Walk district of roads, including the Walk itself, should cease and determine on the 25th day of May 1836 — the Leith Walk district thenceforth to be included in the county of Edinburgh middle district of roads, and kept in repair by the trustees of that district. We do not know during how many years after the erection of the toll-bar on Leith Walk the rates of from Is. to 9s. were exacted ; but for a num- ber of the later years of the toll-bar the charge upon the two-horse stage-coaches, which then leisurely plied on the Walk, was Is. 6d. going and the same returning ; and for some short time previous to the removal of the toll-bar, the toll upon these stage-coaches was modified to ninepence each passing. This was still sufficiently severe for the distance — two miles. During the year preceding the removal of the toll-gate there were, at the reduced toll, three stage-coaches on the Walk, and they man- aged to make six trips up and the same number down daily at the fare of sixpence. Each of these coaches required two pairs of horses — the one to relieve the other. The capital then engaged in those public conveyances was : — Three coaches at £3(k~, — £ 90 0 0 Twelve horses at £10 120 0 0 InalL — £210 0 0 The toll upon these three coaches was 27s. a-day, or £422 ,11s. a-year — being more than double the amount of the ordinary capital required for carrying on the business. Other vehicles, public and private, were, during the twenty-seven years referred to, taxed at this toll-bar according to the same rates, and the toll-bar must either have been very productive to the tacksman, or the traffic, because of the toll, must have been very limited. The cost of maintaining and running these three stage-coaches for the year would be : — Tolls as above mentioned—- £422 11 0 Tear and wear of the coaches and horses — say 20 per cent. 42 0 0 Hay, corn, and stable rent— 15s. per week for each of the twelve horses 468 0 0 Three drivers at 12s. each per week - 93 12 0 Two strappers at 12s. each 62 8 0 Annual cost exclusive of coach licenses and duties £1088 11 0 A great change has since taken place in reference to the public conveyances on this road — a change which is mainly, if not entirely, to be attributed to the abolition of the toll-bar. Since that happy event in 1836 the old lumbering stages have given way to gay and spacious two-horse omnibuses, comfortably fitted up for eighteen passengers each — twelve in and six out. These have gradually increased in number ; and during 1844 there were so many as twenty-one such conveyances constantly plying on the road from morning till night — each making twenty-four trips a-day, twelve up and twelve down, at the small fare of twopence. Many of these omnibuses have four pairs of horses each ; but we believe three and a-half pairs may be 106 ROAD REFORM;, taken as the average, or seven horses for each. The probable capital now engaged in these public conveyances is : — Twenty-one omnibuses at £100 each*~~~ £2100 0 0 147 horses at £10 each _ 1470 0 0 Capital stock* . — . £3570 0 0 The cost of maintaining and running these for the year would be : — Ordinary expenses — Tear and wear of omnibuses and horses at 20 per cent £ 714 0 0 Hay, corn, and stable-rent, at 15s. each horse per week 5,733 0 0 Twenty-one coach-drivers at 12s. each per week 655 4 O Twenty-one hangers-on at 10s. each per week 546 0 0 Twenty-one strappers at 12s. each per week 655 4 0 Office-keepers and check-clerks at £5 per omnibus 105 0 0 £8,408 8 0 Public taxes — Twenty-one coach licenses at three guineas each. ... ............ ..... £63 0 0 Twenty-one coach drivers at £1, 5s. each... 26 5 6 Mileage — one coach 48 miles at Hd. per mile, 6s. per day — twenty-one coaches at this rate per day, £6, 6s. or for a year, less Sundays 1 ,07 1' 1 8 0 2,064 3 0 Annual cost — ...£10,469 11 0 Then, over and above,, the coach proprietors’ profit must be pro- vided for, which, at the moderate computation of twenty shillings for each omnibus per week, would be £1092 for the year, making in round numbers the remunerative sum necessary to be drawn from these coaches upon this road £11,500. To produce this amount in one year, at the fare of twopence, the enormous number of one million three hundred and eighty thousand passengers is required.f This is equal to between eight and nine passengers to each omnibus each trip, which, we believe, is not far from the mark. Assuming an average of nine, the coach proprietor, at twopence each, draws eighteen- pence for their fares. He pays threepence for the mileage of the trip — being a tax of 16f per cent. ; and over and above, he has to pay the annual coach license. The Legislature by a great effort in session 1844 made provi- sion that railway companies should run third-class trains to carry passengers at Id. per mile ; but here, without any such enactment, and by the mere allowing of fair play to the road and to the capitalist, w r e have the same advantage freely given to us — the two miles for two- pence with your choice in or out, in elegant and capacious coaches — the only difference between the railway train and the omnibus being in the matter of time. This affords abundant room for reflection upon the comparative merits of the tolled and the free system of roads. The latter pos- sesses these great advantages — 1. It enables multitudes of people to travel at an almost nominal charge. 2. It gives profitable employ- * These are frequently hired from coach-builders at Id. per mile. The daily distance is 48 miles ; so that the rent drawn for the use of such a vehicle, at that rate, is 4s. daily, or 24s. weekly, or £62, 8s. yearly. t A recent computation by experienced individuals, in reference to the projected railway betwixt Edinburgh and Leith, lias proved our calculation to be very nearly correct; the actual number of passengers on the Walk using these conveyances rather exceeds 1,400,000 a-year. HOAD REFORM. 107 rnent to capital, and bread to numbers of families — coach-makers, office-keepers and clerks, coach-drivers and coach attendants, stablers, strappers, veterinary surgeons, and blacksmiths. 3. It keeps up a continual demand for coach-horses, and in them provides home con- sumers for a prodigious quantity of hay and corn. And 4. It con- tributes largely to the public revenue. It is very true that all roads have not Edinburgh at the one end and Leith at the other; but wherever toll-gates shall be done away, the in- tercourse will always be found to increase in proportion to the popula- tion. Than those omnibi horses, the farmers around Edinburgh cannot pos- sibly have better customers for five thousand pounds worth of their hay and corn annually — a market for which, in a great measure, they have to thank the statute which removed the toll-gate. Had it been continued, the extraordinary rise and progress of the omnibi which we* have pointed out could not possibly have happened. We would still have had the old miserable stage-coaches with the sixpenny fare, but the travelling public not accommodated, and the hay and corn not consumed. The horses on Leith Walk enjoy a very enviable privilege, inasmuch as they have the free run of the road without contributing anything towards its maintenance. The road is kept in apple-pie order for them at the ex- pense of the tolls levied upon other horses using other roads around Edin- burgh. Such is the unfairness of the present system. If road monies are to be raised by collections at toll-gates, why not on Leith Walk as on other roads? The toll-bar on Leith Walk was unquestionably a serious obstacle to the intercourse betwixt Edinburgh and Leith, as toll- bars always are to the localities which they divide or enclose ; but before the removal of that bar some other system of raising money for the road should have been devised than taking it from the tolls paid for the use of other roads. Of the making of Leith accessible to Edinburgh without a toll-tax, the rival port at Granton has good reason to complain — for on the three miles betwixt it and Edinburgh there are two toll-gates — pay- ment required at the one and a ticket at the other. Though not so pal- pable, because of the difference in population, the evils to this port from' the toll-gates have been truly as great as those occasioned to the port of Leith by the Leith Walk toll-gate. Happily for Granton and for the travelling public, the railway now opened to Edinburgh will make them independent of the gates. Hereafter these will annoy only the pro- prietors along the road and their nursery and agricultural tenants, who are tied to the localities, and cannot escape. Unless for catching them the toll-keepers may very soon shut shop. The citizens of Edinburgh, no doubt, will also suffer to some extent, that is such of them as keep horses ; they are free to drive down Leith Walk and luxuriate amid the smoke and stour of Leith, but they cannot get a mouthful of fresh air at Granton without paying a smart toll-tax upon it. Under the plan proposed by us, neither the horses on Leith Walk nor the horses on any other untolled road would longer escape, as they now do, from their due share of road money ; and the rating of all such would so far lighten the burden which has heretofore pressed unjustly on others. Were the rate 30s., the omnibi horses we have spoken of, taking them at 147, would contribute £220, 10s. annually to the support of the two miles — a great help to the road certainly, and but a small addition to the expenses of the coaching establishment. W r e have now explained at considerable length our whole scheme. 108 ROAD REFORM. and in this shape we submit it to the judgment of the public. In the course of stating our main proposal we have incidentally thrown out suggestions for various improvements in the management of roads* which it is in the power of road trustees to take into consideration, and to make trial of, under the present toll-bar system. We need scarcely repeat, however, the opinion at which we have arrived, after the most full and deliberate consideration, that that system, in the best way in which it can be wrought, is not merely complicated, cumbersome, and expensive, but is from its very nature unequal and unjust,, while the scheme which we would substitute in its stead is simple and economical, and would be found as fair as any general rate ever can be- Since the publication of the former edition, our plan has been under the consideration of numerous public bodies. The Scottish press has re- ceived it with marked approbation ; so also have the Town Councils of Cupar, and other burghs. Among the counties who have given it attention are Edinburgh, Fife, Forfar, and Lanark — the two former being the onty counties, so far as we aware, who have pronounced upon it. In Edinburgh the committee (10th March 1846) reported to the fol- lowing effect : — A report was read from the general committee of road trustees on the plan contained in a late publication by Mr Pagan, Cupar-Fife, for the substitution of a tax on horses, in lieu of the present toll-duties. The report stated that the committee felt every desire to entertain the present or any other proposal for maintaining the turnpike roads which might be thought more equitable and less burdensome than the present mode of taxation, but in this county insurmount- able objections present themselves to Mr Pagan’s plan. The evils of the pre- sent system, which appear to be so much felt in Fife and some of the adjoining counties, scarcely, if at all, apply to this county. The rates of toll in those coun- ties appear generally to be higher than here. Besides, they are so interwoven by separate trusts, where an additional rate of toll is chargeable, that occasionally a person cannot travel any great distance in one day without being subjected in the payment of from seven to nine toll-duties. Besides, the town of Cupar, and other considerable towns in the county of Fife, are surrounded by independent bars, and as an instance it is mentioned that there are seven within cry of the market-cross of Cupar, and of the seven so many as five are under separate trusts, so that every one who has occasion to pass through these five bars, though within the same half-hour, must submit to five separate exactions of toll. In this county, on the other hand, no person is subjected to an additional payment of toll oftener than at the distance of six miles, at any bar, in whatever district it may be situ- ate, measuring outwards from the Tron Church of Edinburgh. To remedy the evil felt in the county of Fife and other adjoining counties, Mr Pagan proposes the substitution of a tax of one uniform rate on horses of every description within the county. This would be to introduce a different principle of taxation from that hitherto maintained in turnpike law, whereby the person taking the use of a road contributes to its maintenance, but this only when he has occasion ^ to use it. But by the new plan, probably two-thirds of the horses kept by the tenantry would be subjected in a tax for the maintenance of roads which are never used by them, and when they never go beyond the bounds of the farm ; however, in counties where the traffic is principally confined within the limits of them, and there is not much ingress, the freer intercourse of communication that may take place, when toll-bars are removed, may in a measure compensate the farmer for any inequality of taxation. But in the county of Edinburgh, where the metropolis is situate, and a place of resort to persons residing in all quarters, and consequently from counties where the tax on their horses would be leviable, the use of a very considerable distance of road would be taken be- fore reaching the capital, without paying anything towards its maintenance, and the burden thereof would consequently be thrown wholly on persons keeping horses within the county. In addition to travellers, it may also be noticed that large weekly markets are held in Edinburgh and at Dalkeith, which are the re- ROAD REFORM. 109 sort of a number of carts with grain and other produce from the neighbouring counties, which would still add to the burden. In regard to the city, again, there are a large number of horses kept for coaches, and all other kinds of vehicles, for the use of the inhabitants in going from one quarter of the city to •another. Besides, there are also a great number of horses employed in the transport of coal from the railway and other depots to the residences of the citizens, and in the conveyance of goods betwixt Edinburgh and Leith, &c., which may never enter on a turnpike road, but contribute to the maintenance of the streets they pass over to an independent trust (the middle district.) There would thus be great injustice and inequality in subjecting them to a tax for the repair of turnpike roads which they may never use, and to exempt them would interfere with the principle laid down by Mr Pagan, and numerous similar claims of ex- emption might arise from tenants and others throughout the county having the advantage of railway stations in their immediate neighbourhood ; and moreover, by the uniform rate of taxation proposed, the horses employed in stage-coaches which constantly travel the roads, and add greatly to the expense of their main- tenance, would be subjected in no higher rate of duty than agricultural horses, and those within the city, which may seldom or never be upon the road. After alluding to the difficulty of collecting the assessment, the report concluded by saying that, on the whole, the committee could not recommend to the general meeting to entertain a measure which seems to be fraught with such hazardous consequences. In Fife the committee (10th February 1846) agreed to the following report : — Without entering into minute detail, it appears to your committee that there can be no question that the present system by which revenues are raised for the maintenance of the highways and bridges is complicated and expensive ; that the toll dues fall unequally on those who use the roads ; are not generally proportioned to the damage done by use; and are liable to extensive evasion; and that the statute labour conversion, as a tax for the maintenance of a particular class of roads, is also unequal as respects the use made of such roads ; and that attempts to equalise the burden of turnpike dues have not been in general successful. Your committee are of opinion that these evils might be remedied by the substi- tution of a measure of local taxation ; to which remedy, if the imperfections of the present system do not urge the trustees, it is possible that the change in the thorough traffic, caused by the railways now in progress and' contemplated, will at no late period render it expedient to resort. But in the uncertainty as to the extent and effect of these changes, your com- mittee report their opinion, that at the present time it is not expedient to enter- tain any proposition for a change of system. Under this view, your committee do not enter into the merits of Mr Pagan’s u Plan of Road Reform;” but deem it due to that gentleman to state their unanimous opinion, that the trustees are under great obligations to him for bringing the subject, and more particularly that part of it bearing on the objections to the present system, so distinctly before the public. According to these reports, the one county seems satisfied with the present system, while the other is dissatisfied, and contemplates the possi- bility of a change of some kind or other, some day or other, in conse- quence of the effect of the railways on the roads. Railways undoubtedly, as we have already said, will engross all the thorough traffic between towns. Throughout England not one single coach has been able to hold up against the railway train. Where now are the splendid coaches from London to Dover, Brighton, Southampton, Bristol, Birmingham, York, Oxford, Cambridge, &c. ? One and all of them have knocked under to the railways. The enlivening sounds of their horns will be heard no more. Never again shall we see the gay birthday processions of the London mail-coaches. There a four-horse coach is now one of the curiosities. W r hat, too, has become of the numer- ous coaches betwixt Edinburgh and Glasgow? Why, routed likewise by the railway. One, only one, made an effort to stand out, but it would not 110 ROAD REFORM. do : the expense of road tolls, and the competition of low railway fares, soon drove from the road this last of the Goths. As a necessary consequence, the toll-bar revenue on all roads parallel to railways has fallen nearly to zero, because no longer having any post- ing, or coaching, or carrying, upon them. So also will the revenue from the gates on the main lines throughout Scotland, upon the opening of the progressing and projected railways. Once open the North British, and the great east road to England from Edinburgh by Haddington will be deserted, excepting by the resident gentry and their tenants. The same fate awaits the middle road by Dalkeith, Greenlaw, and Cold- stream. The Caledonian and the Hawick Railways will effectually re- lieve the Hawick and Carlisle road of nearly all its traffic. In like man- ner the Caledonian will supersede that chefd’cevre in Scottish road-making, the Glasgow and London road by Beattock. Its numerous toll-keepers will be mere sinecurists, drawing pay but working none. They will have freedom to snore, not only all night, but all day, without one testy guard or driver to disturb their sweet repose. In this way we might go over the maps of England, Scotland, and Ire- land, and predict with unerring certainty the downfall of the great thorough- fares which the railways have yet left us. Glasgow will soon have railways pouring into it from every point of the compass. So also will Stirling, Perth, Dundee, Forfar, Aberdeen, Inverness, Dumfries, & c. &c. ; Ber- wick, Carlisle, &c. &c. All who keep not horses of their own for their own immediate necessities, will use the railways both for themselves and their goods. The roads then, toll-bars and all, will be quietly left to the rural population ; and upon them the support both of the roads and the toil-keepers will inevitably fall. No longer will toll-keepers have hand- some per centages upon thorough traffic — their present principal means of support. The whole host must live upon the localities for whose special good the toll-gates shall be kept up. Through the erection of new gates the toll-keepers are getting daily more numerous but not less hungry ; and, unpromising as the toll-bar times are, their wages and al- lowances must be increased, like those of the industrious classes, else some fine morning they may surprise the road trustees with a strike. In cheating the toll-gates of their fair proportions, the railways are at sametime lightening the repair of the roads. Not one-half of the present amount will be required ; and the keeping up the ten thousand toll-keepers, toll-gates, and toll-houses, for the little they will have to do, would, in the Edinburgh words, be attended with “ hazardous consequences ” — would be wanton and wasteful extravagance, at the cost of some party or other — the rural population as we believe. If the present expense of assessing and col- lecting and applying road funds be 44 per cent., the future per centage, when road repair costs a half less, will be 88 per cent. Indeed, the toll-keepers at rents of £10, £20, and £30, who form a considerable body, will need an hundred per cent — sometimes more — to keep their families Not unfrequently the amount of their remuneration will be found to exceed the sum required for the road. Of this we are assured by a gentleman largely concerned in the management of the North of Scotland roads, and we firmly believe it. At this time of day, there surely is not any other public tax levied at one-tenth part of the cost of these toll collections. Anticipating the changes we have adverted to, from the roads to the railways, can it be that our enlightened landlords and tenants will ding to a system which will scourge themselves so severely ? When one man can assess and another collect the road rate in a county, why employ an hundred ? On the cross roads 7 when toll-bars shall be ROAD REFORM. Ill done away, there will be more driving and more coaching and carry- ing, especially in connection with railway stations ; and if it be an object to take a few additional pounds of road money out of such traffic, let the coach and carrier’s horses pay a double or triple rate, and the fares be increased to meet it. To new schemes there are always innumerable objections : look back to the virulence with which Mr Hill’s penny post scheme was assailed ! Look now to its perfect success ! Ingenious people may conjure up difficulties in the working of our plan, as in the case of horses chiefly employed in towms or on private roads. But where there is a will there is. a way ; and all such cases, we are sure, would be very easily met and accommodated. Relieve the town carter of the tax on his horse and he would cheerfully pay the road rate. The Edinburgh committee dread the adoption of our plan, lest it might give the horses of other counties a free drive over their roads. But apply it to the whole kingdom wherever toll-bars exist, and that objection is done away. The Edinburgh horses might then take freely to the country, and make excursions over all Scotland without stoppage or payment at any toll-gate. Assuming, however, that our plan were adopted in a single county — Edinburgh for in stance — we question whether many long drives would take place. Those who had to travel “ a very considerable distance of road before reaching the capital” would betake themselves to the railways, and not weary themselves and their horses on the turnpikes. The counties of Argyle and Inverness have had the wisdom to dis- pense with toll-bars and toll-keepers, and weighing-machines, yet w^e never heard any complaint from them of others taking undue use of their roads. We should rather think that they gain more than they lose by having their roads open to adjoining counties and to strangers. In point of liberality they set a good example to the me- tropolitan committee. The Argyleshire roads are maintained by an assessment on the heritors of the county, according to the extent of their possessions — probably the best mode in a pastoral county, where there are very few horses, and the cost of the road repair is inconsiderable. In Inver- ness-shire there is a combined assessment on lands and horses. The Isle of Man has no such thing as a toll-bar. The possessors contri- bute to the roads a certain number of carts, horses, and men yearly, according to the extent of their lands ; each house also contributes one horse, cart, and man — much, in short, on the principle of our statute labour acts. These three portions of the British Isles thus assess and collect their road money without the help of a toll-bar. France, also, has had the wisdom to eschew the toll-bar system. In that country the principal roads are maintained out of the public taxes, and the secondary roads at the expense of their several localities. Those desirous to increase the income-tax and the patronage and the cares of Government will prefer the French system ; those who have many horses, and consequently much driving, but no lands or herit- ages, will prefer the Argyleshire plan — because it lays the expense of the roads on others. With such parties we agree not ; the cost of road repair in every district will always be in exact proportion to the number of horses, and upon them, most fairly, may the road rate be laid. The national revenue has already enough to do, and the rental of lands and houses afford no criterion whatever of their owner’s road traffic. He may have m entailed estate, without inclination or means 112 ROAD REFORM. to improve it, but be content to let things hang as they grow. His en- terprising neighbour may have his horses ever on the road, with mate- rials for draining, fencing, manuring, or building — his extra horses would be assessed for the road rate. Take a mansion uninhabited or possessed by a recluse — Would it be right to subject him in road money to the same amount as the neighbouring squire living in a house of not greater value, but having a numerous stud and splendid retinue, ever taking pennyworths out of the roads ? An assessment on property would allow posting-masters, carriers, manufacturers, coal-proprietors, lime-burners — in short, all those best entitled to pay — to escape with comparative impunity ; the rental of their works would be a mere bagatelle compared with their road traffic. Then, where a work was in connection with a railway, and used no horses whatever, could road money be justly exacted ? A thousand insuperable objections suggest themselves to an assessment on land for road purposes, unless in pastoral counties. In Fife, to raise £32,000 annually — which is under the present amount — the assess- ment on the real rent would be eight per cent., with five per cent, added for collection — evil upon evil. At our estimate of £16,000, the per centage on the county would be four per cent., besides expense of collection. The proprietors in the county, large and small, number so many as 7308, while the horse-owners number 2435 — that is only one-third of the proprietors ; so much the more easy will it be to collect a horse-rate than a land rate. An assessment on land would be a torment to the small proprietors — the holders of cottages and gardens. Such parties are generally ill-prepared for the collector’s call, be his demand ever so little. Let the assessment be upon horses — those employing many would pay many rates ; farmers and others near railway stations, and employing few horses, would pay few rates. One not keeping a horse, but needing an occasional drive, or a race of coals, would indirectly contribute to the reads, be- cause he would necessarily use a rated horse, and have to pay a few pence of additional hire to cover the rate. If it be true that the amount of road repair in a county is always in exact proportion to the number of horses, increasing or diminishing as the horses increase or diminish — a proposition we have never heard controverted — then, un- questionably, horses are the proper subjects to be assessed for road money. Under the turnpike system excellent roads have been provided throughout the three kingdoms ; the toll-bars have done their duty ; a change has come over the spirit of their dream ; they can now w r ell be w r anted ; and contented with their past achievements, they should make their bov r and retire from, public life, bewailing their lost condition in these last words — Tempora rautantur et nos mutamur in-illis. APPENDIX. SCOTCH CASES DECIDED IN REFERENCE TO ROAD TOLLS. L— IN THE COURT OF SESSION, JURY COURT, AND HOUSE OF LORDS. A lady qualified to be a Road Trustee found not entitled to a preference over the other Trustees as to the tolls of a road in payment of advances made by her on the road— Lady M. L. Craufurd, February 14, 1822—1 S. D. 321. Under a local road act authorising Trustees to purchase ground for the erection of toll-houses, and, if the proprietor should refuse to sell, empowering the Quarter Sessions to compel him to do so, found that the Trustees were not entitled to build a toll-house before the purchase was made— Lady M. L. Craufurd, May 16, 1822™! S. D. 414. Proprietors of houses in Inverness held not liable in payment of an assess- ment for the repair of the parliamentary roads — Mackay, May 15, 1824 — 3 S. D. 17. The statute labour trust of Kincardineshire is divided into four districts. The Trustees of one of the districts prosecuted the collector before the Sheriff for a balance due on his intromissions. In an advocation, an objection was taken to the pursuers’ title, they being merely a committee of Trustees ; but the court repelled the objection — Low, June 1, 1826 4 S. 651. An action of reduction and damages was brought against a toll-man who had obtained a decreet of the Justices of Peace for a penalty for evasion of toll, although the act permitted what had been found to be an evasion. It was objected that the action of reduction was incompetent after six months from the conviction. The Lord Ordinary (Medwyn) repelled the objection, but the Court altered and sustained the same — Selkirk, June 10, 1826—4 S. 695. Part of an old parish road intersected by a new turnpike road was assumed and kept in repair by the turnpike Trustees, held to be turnpike to the effect that carriages, &c., going 100 yards along it, and merely crossing the turnpike road, may be subjected in toll— Dixon, June 27, 1826 4 S. D. 759. Road Trustees having right to manage a road from a certain point to <( the city of Glasgow” held entitled to maintain toll-bars within the bounds of the royalty, provided they were beyond the buildings constituting the actual city — Aitken, December 14, 1826—5 S. D. 135. An exemption from payment of toll in a local road act is not derogated from or repealed by a general exemption of a more limited nature introduced into the subsequent General Road Act, and' not inconsistent with the exemption in the local act— M { Callum, March 8, 1827 5 S. D. 541. An original subscriber to a road is not entitled to attach the rents of toll-bars while there is no surplus, after applying them to the purposes provided by the acts of Parliament and the payment of the interest of money borrowed on the security of the tolls — Farie, June 29, 1827 5 S. D. 878. The provisions as to repairing, &c., the turnpike roads contained in certain local turnpike acts for the county of Edinburgh were extended, by another turn- pike act, to the great and cross roads within the toll-bars round the city of Edin- burgh — held, that after the passing of the General Road Act (4 Geo. IV., cap. 49), these previous acts must be read as if the provisions in the General Act were engrossed in them, with reference to the great and cross roads within the bars, equally as the regular turnpike roads Menzies, June 30, 1827—5 S. D. 884 ; May 23, 1828—6 S. D. 845. Proprietors of a canal are not entitled, by themselves or others, to use the towing-path as a road for carriages or carts conveying passengers who had come H 114 APPENDIX. fey their boats, so as to avoid going along a turnpike road, on which they must have paid toll — the Road Act prohibiting the use of any private passage or way whereby the payment of toll might be avoided— Mitchell, July 7, 1827 5 S. D. 909. Remitted by the House of Lords to enquire whether, where a party accused of evading a toll-bar has been assoilzied by the J ustices of the Peace from a demand for statutory penalties, the Court of Session has jurisdiction, in advoca- tion, to find him guilty and award the penalty, July 14, 1830 — 4 W. S. 162 ; found in the negative, January 21, 1832 — 10 S. D. B. 230. Questions whether the tacksman of tolls on a road is entitled to exact as much toll on carts with broad as with narrow wheels, and whether the clerk of the Road Trustees has a title to interdict him from doing so — Dykes, November 24, 1827 — 6 S. D. 123. A tacksman of a toll-bar, who had never complained of the omission to put up a table of rates, and had never asked for a copy, not entitled at the end of the year to refuse payment of his rent on account of the want of it— Parlane, June 14, 1828—6 S. D. 977. A party purchased a parcel of ground, and made a road to enable him to pass from a turnpike road at the extremity of one trust to a parish road without passing through a toll-bar within the next trust — held that this was an evasion of that toll, not protected by the exception in the General Road Act in favour of the proprietors passing along their own private roads— Merry, November 29, 1828— 7 S. D. 90. Trustees having shut up part of a road not turnpike for the purpose of bringing persons travelling along it into the turnpike road in order to make them pay toll, parties removing the obstructions not allowed their expenses, in respect of having removed the obstruction brevi manu instead of applying for redress by law —Trustees of Glasgow and Carlisle Road, December 2, 1828—7 S. D. 115. Statute labour Trustees having bound themselves to repay an advance as soon, after the lapse of five years as the funds would admit of it — held that they were bound to pay the claim although without trust funds, if they might have been in funds had they not incurred expenses which they were not obliged to do, and paid debts not preferable to this claim Aitken, February 10, 1829—7 S. D. 390. A complaint was presented to the Justices of the Peace, complaining that the toll-man had exacted second toll the same day, and- refused to allow the com- plainer to pass, and concluding for £5 to the private complainer, £5 to the Procurator-Fiscal, and for one month’s imprisonment, with expenses. A minute was afterwards lodged, restricting the conclusions to the penalty of £5, and expenses. The J ustices of the Peace found the defender liable in a penalty of £2, 2s., and expenses. The Quarter Sessions confirmed the judgment. A sus- pension was presented to the Court of Justiciary. It was objected to as incom- petent under the statutes. But the Court, on the ground that the prayer of the petition was not warranted by the statute, suspended the decreet, with costs against the private party — Dumbreck, March 14, 1828 — Deas and Ander- son’s Rep. A party took a lease of a toll-bar advertised to be let by the General Road Trustees of a county, but of which the lease was granted by those of the district in which the toll-bar was placed ; and the tolls were evicted by the erection of check bars in another district — held competent for the tacksman to insist in an action against the General Trustees and the District Trustees by whom the lease was granted, for reparation of the loss suffered by the eviction— Fairlie, May 22, 1829—7 S. D. 637. An action of damages was brought against the tacksman of a toll-bar and his servant, and the farmer of the post-horse duty and his servant, for the stoppage of one of the mourning coaches attending the funeral of the pursuer’s brother, on account of an erroneous ticket. The Jury found for the toll-man and servant, but awarded £5 of damages against the farmer of the horse-duty— Crawfurd, March 15, 1830 — 5 Murray, 215. A gentleman was joint clerk-depute of the Justices of the Peace of a district, and at sametime clerk to the Trustees of a road in the same district. As clerk to the Trustees he raised an action against two persons for evasion of toll. His clerk acted for the prosecution, and also as clerk to the Justices. The Justices were, however, advised by their principal clerk, and one of the offenders ‘was fined. A complaint was thereon presented to the Court of Session by the person fined to have the clerk removed or suspended, founding on the act of sederunt APPENDIX. 115 6th March, 1783, which declares it to be illegal for any one to conduct a cause as agent in a court in which he holds the office of clerk. An objection was taken to the title of the prosecutor to sue without concourse of the public prose- cutor. The title was sustained, and the clerk suspended for twelve months, and costs awarded. The House of Lords reversed as to the suspension, but awarded £200 costs — M‘Farlane, April 8, 1830 — 5 Shaw, 537 ; and 4 Shaw’s Appeal Cases, 123. A bill of suspension and interdict by the keeper of an inn to prohibit a neigh- bouring toll-keeper from selling exciseable liquors, as having no permission from the Road Trustees, having been refused by the Lord Ordinary without answers, on the ground that he had no title to complain, the Court remitted to order in- timation in common form — Thomson, June 24, 1830 — 8 S. D. B. 966. Under the General Road Act, a summary action for recovering payment of tolls, without previous seizure of the carriage, &c., of the party refusing to pay, is competent before the Sherifff—Simpson, June 25, 1830 — 8 S. D. B. 977- The question, What carriages under the General Road Act are entitled to ex- emption ? is a matter committed to the Sheriff by the statute, and his judgment thereon is final and conclusive — Simpson, June 25, 1830 8 S. D. B. 977- A cart belonging to a carrier and itinerant dealer in groceries, and in which, besides his own goods, he carries goods and parcels belonging to others for money, is to be considered as let out for hire, and therefore not exempted from pontage on passing a bridge a second time within the same day — Armstrong, June 25, 1830—8 S. D. B. 980. Under the General Road Act — which provides, that if Trustees “ shall erect” a toll-bar without authority in any act of Parliament, it shall be lawful to com- plain to the Sheriff or Justices of Peace, and that the judgment of the Sheriff or Justices in all matters committed to them shall be final and without review — it is incompetent to apply to the Court of Session for interdict against the erection of such bar, and equally incompetent though the bar has not been erected, but merely a warrant granted to erect it — Wilson, June 11, 1839 — 9 S. D. B. 7'25. Penalties being imposed by a road act for evasion of tolls, on conviction u before one or more Justices of the Peace,’’ with leave to parties considering themselves aggrieved to apply by summary complaint to the Court of Session for redress — held that an advocation was a competent form of complaint ; that the court had no jurisdiction to convict and find offenders liable in the penalties ; and that there must be a conviction by the J ustices — Mitchell, January 21, 1832 — 10 S. D. B. 230. A complaint was presented to the Sheriff of Lanarkshire against a toll- man exacting toll where the party did not travel one hundred yards on the road to which the toll-bar belonged. The defence was, that a portion of road was com- mon to two Trusts (which formerly had been one), and, reckoning this portion of the road, the statutory length was travelled. The Sheriff sustained the defence. The Lord Ordinary and the Court found an advocation incompetent, but thought, that the question might have been originally brought before them by way of declarator— Nelson, March 10, 1832 JO S. 466. The Fife tolls were let under the local and general acts, with an express ex- emption for horses or carriages only crossing the turnpike, or not travelling more than one hundred yards thereon. The Letham toll-bar across the new Dundee road has two check-bars on the Letham road, which is statute labour. But power was given in the act to make it turnpike. The toll-man exacted toll- duties from carts crossing the turnpike by the Letham road. The Trustees, on the ground that these bars were merely check -bars for the new Dundee road, presented complaints against the toll-man, who brought an action of declarator and damages against the Trustees, which was sent to a jury, and, under the direction of the Lord- Justice Clerk, a verdict was given for the Trustees — Patterson, March 19, 1832 — Deas and Anderson Rep. By the local act the county of Peebles is divided into six districts. The clerk of one district prosecuted the clerk of another district as to the position of a toll- bar. The Court unanimously found that as district clerk he had no title to sue, and that the clause in the general act applied only to the general clerk, and not to district clerks — Williamson, March 2, 1832 — 10 S. 413. Under a temporary road act, allowing certain parties, by payment of a sum of money, to contract for the removal of a toll-bar, the money having been paid and the bar removed at the commencement of the period of the act — held that this 116 APPENDIX. contract was not limited to the endurance of the statute, but was permanent and obligatory on the Trustees under subsequent acts, though containing no provision for renewing it — Donald, November 27, 1832^11 S. 119. A toll-keeper is not bound by an agreement to accept of under toll (this being contrary to the Road Act), but may charge full toll, though the party with whom it was made alleged he had a choice of two roads, and had been induced to use one of them for a year on the faith of the agreement Balfour, June 26, 1833 — 11 S. 784. But see cases in House of Lords, 4th April 1831, Maxwell and Co. ; and 6th July 1835, Swan v. Blair. Toll-books made up daily of the number and weight of carts passing the bar from jottings taken as each cart passed — held, with the oath of the toll-keeper in supplement, to prove the amovmt of carriage on which toll-dues had been in- curred during the year~~Balfour, June 26, 1833 11 S. 784. A tacksman and cautioners defended against payment of the rent, because the tacksman had not been put in complete possession of the subject let, and that certain evasions had not been prevented by the Trustees. The case being sent to a jury, a verdict was given for the Trustees under deduction of £10 — Threshie, J uly 18, 1833 — Jurist. A creditor having lent money on a bond granted by the Trustees of a certain district, without limitation, was found entitled to be preferred on the tolls of the whole district, although it was shown by the minutes of the Trustees that the security was intended to be confined to one particular line of road, unless it were proved that such limitation was previously communicated to him — Threshie, November 21, 1833 12 S. 105. An application under 4 Geo. IV., cap. 49, for the removal of a toll-bar, and to interdict the levying of toll there, having been presented to the Sheriff within six months after a table of rates was put up, and posts with a chain thrown across the road, and the Sheriff having pronounced judgment in terms thereof — an advocation held incompetent^Lang, June 12, 1834 — 12 S. 719. A check toll-bar was complained of to the Sheriff, who, after a proof, ordered it to be removed, and interdicted its being placed without form of law. The Lord Ordinary and the Court held this judgment not subject to review — Martin, June 12, 1834^12 S. 719. A tacksman of tolls is not entitled to retain rent, on the allegation that by the operations of the Road Trustees a part of the road was rendered impassable, and bill of suspension of a charge therefor refused to be passed even on consignation —Hill, Nov. 25, 1834 — 13. S. 88. Special case, involving, inter alia , the order in which a certain Road Trustee in Peeblesshire should be ranked in competition with certain other Road Trus- tees on the revenue of the tolls of a district of roads in respect of disbursements by him — Perrier, Feb. 19, 1835^13 S. 489. Circumstances in which interdict was granted against the Trustees of one sub- district of roads from erecting three check-bars which would intercept and greatly injure the tolls of another sub-district ; in respect, inter alia , that these sub-dis- tricts, having previously formed one district, and having contracted a cumulo debt, a division of that debt took place when the sub-districts were formed, and a proportion of the cumulo debt was allocated upon each sub-district correspond- ing to its existing tolls Carmichael, June 28, 1836 — 14 S. 1013. Circumstances in which the Court held a bill of suspension of diligence for levying an assessment of statute labour conversion money an incompetent pro- ceeding, and accordingly refused the bill — Ewing, January 26, 1837 — 15 D. 419. In an action of damages by the tacksman of a toll-bar against the Road Trus- tees for wrongfully shutting up one of four roads after letting the toll-duties thereon to him — verdict for the pursuer and damages assessed at £30 — Murray, March 21 , 1837—15 D. 890. Held, under the provisions of a county road act, that a toll-keeper had no title to pursue for penalties alleged to have been incurred by evading the toll-bar, although the subject let to him by the Trustees was described as “ the whole tolls and duties and penalties for evading the same’’ — Mitchell, June 26, 1839 — 1 Bell, 1115. In a local act of Parliament authorising certain tolls to be levied for passing a bridge, carriages returning and repassing the bridge the same day were declared to be exempt from toll. But in case such carriages should “ pass the bridge with a new loading a second or more times in the same day,” they were then to APPENDIX. 117 be deprived of the benefit of the exemption. Held, that brewers’ carts passing the bridge, carrying ale and spirits in casks and bottles from a cellar to a retail shop, and returning the same day with a different set of empty casks and bottles, which had been taken full a day or two before, were only liable for toll on pass- ing the bridge the first time — the empty casks and bottles not being considered to be a “ new loading” in the sense of the act— Hossack & Co., Nov. 23, 1839 — 2 Bell, 129. Statutes 4 Geo. IV., cap. 49, and 1 and 2 Will. IV., cap. 43 (General Hoad Acts) — Held, on construction of the general road acts, that when a road is divided into districts assigned to committees of Trusts, the clerk appointed for any district is entitled to sue under the 16th section of the statute 1 and 2 Will. IV., cap. 43 —Creighton (House of Lords), 26th May, 1840. Where the roads in a county were, by authority of the general turnpike and local statutes, divided into districts, which were placed under the management of separate bodies of Trustees, who had each their clerk or treasurer — Held, that an action for reparation for injury sustained within one of these districts, in con- sequence of alleged insufficiency in the fencing of the road, was incompetently directed against the clerk of the general meeting of Hoad Trustees for the county — Revey, March 11, 1841 3 Bell, 888. The tacksman of certain toll-dues raised an action against the Road Trustees, concluding partly for repetition of rent paid and partly for damages in respect of alleged non-implement of obligations undertaken by the Trustees in the articles of roup under which he had become tacksman — Held, that the statute 1 and 2 Will. IV., cap. 43, sec. 118, did not reach such action, and that the right to insist wss not cut off although more than six months had elapsed from the date of the wrong complained of before raising the action — Somerville, Dec. 23, 1842 — 5 Bell, 383. The Court, affirming the judgment of the Lord Ordinary, held that the military and parliamentary road repair assessment for the county of Inverness was, in terms of the act 59 Geo. III., cap. 135, properly laid upon the amount of rents and profits as assessed to the property tax in the year 1814; the defender resist- ing this criterion upon the ground that since the year 1814 his property had de- creased two-thirds in value, and that by the eleventh section of the statute it was provided that in making the assesment regard should be had to certain other statutes, assessments under which were upon the real rent— Thomson, Dec. 14., 1843—6 Bell, 230. IL— SPECIMEN OF CASES DECIDED IN THE LOCAL COURTS. The Justices of the Peace at Glasgow, in Quarter Sessions, held that brewers’ carts passing and paying toll with fuli barrels are entitled to return the same day with empty barrels without incurring new toll, although not the same barrels as had previously passed the same day, but barrels which had passed and paid on previous days Steel, Aug. 24, 1821. The same judgment given Struthers & Son, Dec. 29, 1821. Where a toll-man had beat and cut a passenger attempting evasion, the passen- ger was fined by the Justices of the Peace in £2, with £3 of expenses for the evasion. The Sheriff of Dumbartonshire decerned against the toll-man for £14 of damages and £2 of fine for the assault. But, on advocation to the Court of Justiciary, the damages were increased to £100 and £5 of fine, with expenses M'Farlane, 1828. Case of the pontage-keeper of Ayr bridge, who was decerned to repay an extra pontage levied by him— Nov. 1828. The Dumbartonshire Trust ends near Yoker toll-bar, -where the Lanarkshire trust begins. Certain millers in the neighbourhood of the toll-bar entered by a parish road on a turnpike about seventy yards from the bar, which they in- sisted on passing toll-free because they did not travel one hundred yards on the road to which the bar was attached. The Sheriff of Dumbartonshire held that toll was exigible— Yoker Road Trustees, 12th April, 1830. A gentleman who was a member of the Episcopal Communion usually attended the Presbyterian Church of the parish in which his estate was situated, but oc- casionally went to Perth to the Episcopal Chapel, especially on solemn occasions. The Sheriff-Substitute of Perthshire (Mr Husband) found toll due on such oc- 118 APPENDIX. casions — the chapel not being the person’s usual place of worship—. Graeme, April 22, 1831. A lady, whose usual residence was Glasgow, and who had been two weeks re- sident at Bridge of Allan, was found by the Sheriff of Stirling liable in toll when going to the church at Logie, being the church of the parish in which she was then resident, that not being her usual place of worship — Steven, 1831. A gentleman hired a gig, and was driven by a boy to Stirling, whence he sent it back with a lady, driven by the same boy. Toll being again exacted, the Sheriff at Stirling (Mr Frazer) found, in terms of the General Hoad Act, that second toll was not due because the gig was on the same hire, although the local act warranted toll on every change of loading — McDonald, April 1832. The Sheriff at Edinburgh (Mr Tait) found that a military officer was not en- titled to exemption from toll when travelling in a hired chaise — Spears, keeper of Bonnington toll, October 1832. The Sheriff of Perthshire (Dunblane district) found that a cart of such a de- scription as came under the assessment for taxed carts was subject to toll-duty as such, though not actually assessed, and though not let for hire — M‘Donald, Oc- tober 24, 1832. The Sheriff of Stirlingshire (Mr Frazer) found that a toll-man was entitled to exact double toll on carts having only the company firm, and not “ the Christian name and surname of the principal partner,” on the carts — M‘Pherson and M‘Naughton, November 12, 1832. Two military officers having passed a toll-bar driving gigs — in an action for the penalties by the toll-man, before the Sheriff-Substitute at Glasgow, because of their having claimed exemption from toll to which they were not entitled, the Sheriff-Substitute found each liable in the full penalty. The Sheriff adhered, but modified the penalty to £1, Is. each Peacock, February 21, 1833. The Sheriff of Perthshire (Dunblane) found that the exemption in the English Road Act in favour of voters going to and from poll in elections did not extend to Scotland — Procurator-Fiscal, February 1833. A Forfarshire farmer rented land from the same landlord on both sides of the Esk. In going from the one to the other between his steading and field, his carts had to pass a toll-bar. He claimed exemption, which the Sheriff-Substitute refused ; but the Sheriff reversed, and found toll not exigible. The toll-keeper appealed to the Circuit Court, when Lord Medwyn reversed the judgment of the Sheriff and returned to that of the Substitute — Fettes, April 19, 1833. The Sheriff of Ayr found that a cart carrying meal to a town and returning with coals, both for the owner and not for hire, was no new loading so as to warrant exaction of new toll Douglas, March 5, 1833. A Stirlingshire toll-man charged three shillings for two horses drawing two carts having a log of wood suspended between them. He had weighed the first carriage, and then the second — the two, however, continuing attached. He found the weight exceeded 35 cwt. ; he therefore charged one shilling for the two horses, and triple for the weight, all in terms of the local act for that county. The owner paid the demand of three shillings, but brought an action of repetition of toll before the Sheriff of Stirling; action dismissed Culbert, October 18, 1833. A carrier bringing coals on his own risk, and not on hire, to Crieff, and return- ing empty; and between 12 o’clock and 12 o’clock, returning with another cart of coals, still on his own risk and not on hire (the local act allowing passing four times), was found not subject to second toll — J ustices at Crieff, Sir Patrick Murray presiding — McCulloch, August 4, 1834. By the local act for Perthshire the toll is laid on the horse in draught, and four passings are allowed for the same toll the same day. In an action for repe- tition of toll exacted on the same horse drawing a different cart, the Sheriff found against the toll-keeper, and decerned him to pay ten shillings of penalty — Syme, April 1, 1835. Carters employed by a company having been instructed by their employers not to pay toll, the toll-keeper brought an action against their employers for the penalties attaching to the evasion. The Sheriff-Substitute found the employers were not liable, but the Sheriff reversed, and awarded a penalty against each of them, for which, with the toll-duty due on each of the occasions, he decerned against them and for expenses Patterson, May 12, 1835. The Strath-Tay Road Trustees disputed with the Tummell Bridge Trustees as to a check-bar erected by the latter. A reference was entered into, and the APPENDIX. 119 arbiters found that the bar could not be continued. The Bridge Trustees, how ever, became of opinion that the reference was beyond their powers, and that they could not remove the bar without the consent of creditors on the road ; whereon the Strath-Tay Trustees presented a complaint to the Sheriff of Perthshire to have the bar removed from their road. The Sheriff-Suhstitute decerned the de- fenders, the Tummell Bridge Trustees, to remove the bar, and interdicted them from levying toll thereat. The Sheriff (Mr Anderson) affirmed the judgment — M ‘Donald, July 24, 1835. The clerk of a district of the county of Perth pursued one of the tacksmen of tolls in the district for levying tolls contrary to his lease, and to the injury of other bars on the road. The Sheriff and his Substitute, in deference to the de- cision in the case of Williamson v. Goldie, dismissed the complaint — Moncrieff, September 15, 1835. [Note.— The above are taken from Mr Sheriff Barclay’s Law of the Road.] The Ayr Quarter Sessions by a majority affirmed a judgment of the Petty Sessions finding toll due in passing from one farm to another, a quarter of a mile from each other, possessed by the same proprietor, and under one system of ro- tation in croppings Ayr Justice of Peace Court, June 29, 1836. The defender was tacksman of a bar at A. Another person was tacksman of a bar at B. There was a check C between A and B held by the defender. He was taken bound to levy toll at the bar A or C, at whichever bar passage was first made. Tickets at A and B cleared at C, and the reverse. The Trustees prosecuted for penalties, because that by collusion with cattle-dealers the defender exacted less than the legal toll at A and C, and so cleared the bar at B to the prejudice of that toll’s revenue. The Sheriff- Substitute held (affirmed by Sheriff Anderson), that where the cattle were rested in a field between A and C, new toll was exi- gible at both bars if collusion was not proved, but that it was illegal to charge toll at both bars in the same day to the prejudice of the bar B — Tay Bridge Trus- tees, December 7 , 1836 — Perth Court. A cart passed a check-toll between eleven and twelve at night, and paid the toll on horse and cart; passed the main bar between twelve and one, and paid toll on over-weight, there being no weighing-machine at the check. Next night returned to main bar between eleven and twelve, and was charged no toll, but at the check was charged new toll for second day, it being then past twelve. The Sheriff-Substitute held that both bars must be held as one, and that no new toll was exigible, the passing the main bar being the rule for calculating the time™. Crieff Circuit Small Debt Court, October 6, 1838. A farmer took a field beyond a toll-bar for six months. Found that the cattle passing to and from the field and steading daily were exempt from toll, though the field was not part of the same farm, but contiguous Scone toll-bar, May 14, 1840 — Perth Sheriff Court. A toll-keeper was found liable for the value of a horse seized for toll, and tied to the bar in a very cold night, when he had the offer of the saddle in security — Sheriff Court, Edinburgh, February 1841. The Sheriff- Substitute of Selkirkshire found that Road Trustees could prose- cute without concurrence of the Fiscal, and that a person going a private road, being the nearest to and from a place and his own residence, was not liable in penalty where it did not appear he took the road with intent to evade the toll — March 13, 1841. In an action for a large sum of toll-duties for every passing of a stage-coach for a length of time — defence : limitation of action as to a certain portion ; imple- mented contract of composition as to remainder — the Sheriff-Substitute held (affirmed by Sheriff Anderson) that the claim so far was cut off by the six months’ limitation, and that the implemented agreement could not now be opened up as to the remainder, although it might be held illegal, and to subject the toll-man in a penalty — Watson, November 3, 1841 — Perth Sheriff Court. A vehicle, though being on springs, used for carrying race-horses, held to fall under the class of waggons and not of carriages — Ramsay of Barnton, January 19, 1844 — Perth Court. The proprietor of a menagerie was taxed for the van which contained his family as a carriage. Held he was entitled to pass on the toll applicable to that class — Procurator-Fiscal, August 23, 1844 — Perth Court. [Note.— These have been obligingly furnished to us by Mr Sheriff Barclay.] 120 APPENDIX. A party prosecuted at the instance of the Hoad Trustees for breaking open Strathmiglo toll-bar fined £3, 3s. — Wallace, November 2, 1829 — Justice of Peace Court, Auchtermuchty. Question whether a cattle-dealer who had used a bye-road in driving a lot of cattle was guilty of evasion of toll — Strathmiglo Road Trustees, J une 1 831 Fife Sheriff Court. A petition was presented to the Sheriff of Fife by the Trustees on the Newport road, setting forth that the tacksman of the toll-bar at Newport had allowed his rent to fall into arrear, and praying for his removal and the appointment of a collector ; the petition ordered to be served on him, and also on his cautioner — Berry, May 26, 1830. June 7 — Order for removal granted, and person appointed in his stead to collect and account ; report by the collector lodged, and commission granted to take her oath thereto ; oath reported, and approved, and expenses de- cerned for against tacksman and cautioner ^Tune 31, 1831. An action for an account of tolls dismissed in respect the Trustees or the toll- keeper had not put up a printed table or schedule containing the name of the toll- bar, with the rates of the tolls, as required by 4 Geo. IY., cap. 49, sect. 42 — Paterson, January 30, 1834— Fife Sheriff Court. The Fife Turnpike Act limited the tolls upon broad- wheeled carts to one-half of the tolls upon carts with common wheels, while the General Turnpike Act, 1 and 2 William IY., cap. 43, passed subsequently, authorised Road . Trustees to exempt broad- wheeled carts from part of the toll-duties, not exceeding one-third. The tacksman of Newburgh bar charged according to the latter act — that is, two- thirds of the ordinary toll ; and a party residing in Perthshire having refused pay- ment of more than half-toll, he sued him before the Sheriff Court at Perth for the two-thirds, and obtained decree. The Justice of Peace Fiscal, Auchtermuchty district of Fife, then instituted a libel against the toll-keeper for having made that exaction. The toll-keeper pled — 1. That the deeree of the Sheriff of Perth was a sufficient voucher for the legality of his exaction ; 2. At any rate, that the General Turnpike Act, and not the local act, regulated the matter in question, and justified his charge ; and 3. That the wheels of the carts had not the fillies of the required breadth, and were not cylindrical, nor of the construction pre- scribed by the act. The J ustices, taking a different view from the Sheriff at Perth, repelled the two first pleas, but ordered the prosecutor to condescend on the facts he could prove as to the third plea. The case went no farther— Tod, May 2, 1836. A similar case, where the same toll-keeper had exacted two-thirds toll from another party, was prosecuted at sametime by the Procurator-Fiscal, and shared the same fate— May 2, 1836. A party was tried for an alleged assault upon the collector of the pontage at Leven, but the case dismissed, as it appeared the pontage collector had pro- voked the assault— Procurator-Fiscal, November 30, 1837 — Fife Sheriff Court. A builder in St Andrews sued for repetition of tolls in the following circum- stances : His carts on entering St Andrews from the west paid at the Argyle toll- bar, and in going to the Shore Bridge on the east they were charged again at the toll-bar there, although they did not travel a hundred yards upon the turnpike road at this bar. Found that this second toll was illegally exacted, and repeti- tion ordered, with expenses— Mitchell, December 14, 1837— Fife Sheriff Court. A toll-keeper prosecuted a tenant for an account of toll-duties incurred in cart- ing sand and lime and stones through his toll-bar. The tolls were payable by the contractors for the building, but the toll-keeper insisted against the tenant because of the carts being his. The builder, in name of the tenant, resisted the claim to a certain extent, because, though few of the carts had been weighed, all of them were charged according to weight — those with sand, which cost only sixpence at the sand-pit, at the high rates of one shilling and sixpence and one shilling and eightpence; and he produced an account, rendered previous to the action, where the tolls were charged on a lower scale than in the account libelled on. The Sheriff disallowed the high tolls charged on such of the carts as were not weighed —Berwick, April 19, 1838 — Fife Sheriff Court. A party prosecuted the toll-keeper at Newburgh bar for repetition of certain alleged over-exactions for tolls on carts. He had charged them at fourpence half- penny each, whereas, had they been weighed, threepence each was alleged to be the full charge. The toll-keeper defended himself, on the ground that owing to the length of the axles the wheels of the carts were wider placed than ordinary APPENDIX. 121 wheels, and consequently would not go on his steelyard, which was of the common construction. His practice was to charge all vehicles he could not weigh nine- pence each ; and, assuming the wheels to be of the proper breadth, and cylindri- cal, &c. (which he denied), he had given the pursuer the full benefit of the local act clause by exacting fourpence halfpenny for half toll — Hendry and Son, De- cember 3, 1839 — Fife Small Debt Court. The Teuchats toll-bar stands at the crossing of the Cupar and Largo, and Pra- tis and Falfield roads. The tenant of an adjoining coalfield had his access to it only by the latter of these roads, and in order to get to the former without pay- ment of toll, he made a road across some land belonging to a different estate, under which also the tenant had a lease of the minerals. The toll-keeper pre- sented a petition to have him interdicted from using this road, on the ground that his toll was thereby evaded, but interim interdict refused — Paton, April 1840 — Fife Sheriff Court. A gentleman in the East of Fife with a hired gig passed the Guard Bridge bar during the day and paid toll. He returned in the night and was charged again. In a prosecution for repayment of the second exaction he maintained that it was not midnight when he repassed ; and moreover, that he would have been entitled to repass any time within the twenty-four hours without a second toll. His first defence was sustained. At sametime the Justices were of opinion that his second plea would have been invalid^A. v. B., January 1839~~Fife Quarter Sessions. The carts of a farmer loaded with grain passed a toll-bar in going to Inver- keithing market, and were paid for. The grain was sold, and brought back in the carts by the same road, and the toll-keeper exacted a second toll. Found, in an action for repetition by the farmer, that this second exaction was illegal — A. v. B., June 30, 1840 — Dunfermline Sheriff Court. A farmer was prosecuted at the instance of the Procurator-Fiscal with evading Pitscottie toll by driving twelve cattle along an old road leading from Blebo Crags. He pled in defence that the road used by him had never been shut. His defence was sustained, and the case dismissedLjProcurator-Fiscal of the Fife Justice of Peace Court, September 10, 1840. A case of some importance to toll-collectors came before Sheriff Alison, in the Glasgow Small Debt Court. It was an action at the instance of the Procurator- Fiscal for the county against the tacksman and toll-keeper at Baillieston toll, for the statutory penalty, arising out of the following circumstances : — Mr Gerard of Bochsoles was coming into Glasgow on the 4th October last, in his carriage, and he paid the toll at Coatdyke bar, and received a ticket clearing several other bars, and among the number that of Baillieston. On arriving at Baillieston, Mr Gerard presented his ticket to the toll-gatherer, who declared it correct. Mr Gerard then requested the ticket back, but the toll-man refused to give it unless he were to be paid a shilling, and followed up his refusal by the most unseemly language, and the grossest epithets towards Mr Gerard. The defence was, that by the articles of roup, the toll-gatherer at Baillieston was entitled to keep the pass-tickets given at Coatdyke, so as to arrange his accounts with that toll- keeper — that the ticket was equal in value to a shilling to the tacksman at Baillieston — and that there was nothing in the act directing the ticket to be given back after being shown to the toll-man ; besides, as Mr Gerard was going to Glasgow, he did not again require the ticket. The Sheriff held that nothing could justify the language made use of by the toll-man — that the act of Parliament de- clared merely that the ticket should be produced to the toll-man, not to be re- tained by him — that it was no business of the toll-gatherer what road a traveller might go, as by a change of route he might have occasion to pass some others of the bars — and he added, that in Lanarkshire the toll-keepers seemed to be more ignorant of the law than in any other county in Scotland. He, therefore, awarded a penalty of £3, 3s. against the toll-gatherer, reserving action against the princi- pal tacksman if the toll-gatherer did not pay the fine — Nov. 1841. The Trustees of the Cupar District of Fife Turnpikes in spring 1841 agreed to accept compositions from the medical gentlemen in the district for freedom to pass all the toll-bars in the district at £1, 2s. for each one-horse carriage or gig, and 7s. for each riding horse. One of their number had a lady with him one day in his carriage, and, notwithstanding his composition ticket, he was charged toll at Newburgh bar, on the plea that the composition was a personal one, and did not extend to others. The Procurator-Fiscal prosecuted the toll-keeper for 122 APPENDIX. having exacted toll in the circumstances, and the Sheriff found he had done wrong, and imposed a modified fine — Methven, 1841. A party was tried before the Sheriff of Fife, charged, at the instance of the Procurator-Fiscal, with assaulting a toll-keeper during night, whom he thought over-exorbitant in his toll exaction ; found not proven 7th February 1842. The tacksman of Balgarvie bar prosecuted a carter for 4d. The defender had passed the toll on the 6th September with his cart loaded with persons going to Perth to see the Queen, and paid toll. He returned with his load next morning about two o’clock. A second toll was demanded, which he refused to pay. Mr Sheriff Jameson found the exemption pled by the defender applicable only to horses paying post-horse duty, and decerned in terms of the libel November 3, 1842~~Fife Sheriff Court. A person sent a loaded cart from Wemyss through Windygates toll-bar, and paid the toll. The same day the same cart returned to Wemyss with anew load- ing, and a second toll was exacted. The owner prosecuted the toll-keeper for re- petition, and the Sheriff-Substitute, after three different hearings, decerned the toll-keeper to repeat and pay expenses — Ireland, December 8, 1842 — Leven Cir- cuit Court. Another case was tried between the same parties in similar circumstances be- fore the ordinary court. On the refusal to pay a second toll for the return load- ing, the toll-keeper seized and detained the horse and cart. A record was made up, and the Sheriff-Substitute found that the toll-keeper, under the special terms of the Fife Road Act, was not entitled to the second toll demanded by him, and ordained him to deliver up the horse, &c. The Sheriff (Mr Monteith) reversed. The case was advocated to the Court of Session, but not prosecuted to a conclu- sion — Ireland, April 4, 1843 — Fife Sheriff Court. The tacksman of Linton toll-bar charged toll upon carts going with oats to be mealed at a mill, and he exacted a second toll upon their return with the meal. This second exaction was found illegal, and the toll-keeper decerned to repay Peeblesshire Small Debt Court, 26th January, 1843. Four cases, at the instance of the St Andrews District Road Trustees against parties for payment of tolls at the Dairse check-bar, remitted to the ordinary roll — Bain, 9th May 1843 Fife Sheriff Court. A carter was charged with evasion of toll, by passing from the turnpike road leading through the farm of Ilayfield by a private road on the Dunnikier estate leading to Kirkaldy. The defender admitted by declaration, emitted before the Justices, that he had used said road, and pled he had a right to do so, being at the time in the employment of the tenant of Bogie lime-work — the proprietor of which was also proprietor of the farm of Hayfield. The Justices fined him Is., with expenses. He appealed against this judgment to the Quarter Sessions ; ap- peal dismissed by a majority of 14 to 3~~Justice of Peace Fiscal, Oct. 31, 1843 Fife Quarter Sessions. A landlord prosecuted a tenant for the statute labour paid for his farm during the last two years of his lease, amounting to £13, 12s. lOd. The tenant resisted the demand, on the ground that by agreement with the landlord the latter had accepted a slump sum in full of his rents and of everything that could be de- manded from him at his way-going. It was pled in reply, that the statute labour had never been mentioned, either in course of the negotiation about the agree- ment or in the agreement itself, and was not intended to be covered by the slump payment made. After a reference to the tenant’s oath, the Sheriff held the agreement sufficiently comprehensive, and dismissed the case — Malcolm, No- vember 5, 1844„~Fife Sheriff Court. The defender was a servant to the tenant of Bogie, on the estate of Dunnikier, and was charged by the Justice of Peace Procurator-Fiscal with evasion of toll- duty, by passing from the turnpike road along the road by Hayfield, but after- wards returning upon the turnpike road, for the purpose of evading Bennochy bar. The case was tried before the Justices at Kirkaldy on 6th and 27th Janu- ary, when the defender pled he was acting in the employment of his master, a tenant on the Dunnikier estate, who was entitled to use the cross road. The J ustices dismissed the case. Appeal taken on the part of the complainer, which was advised on 4th March by the Quarter Sessions, who unanimously dismissed the appeaUs>Adamson, 4th March, 1845^.Fife Quarter Sessions. APPENDIX. 123 ADDITIONAL CASES. COURT OF SESSION. Tolls of a road being insufficient to pay the interest of the debt upon it, and there being a loss of about £130 per annum, question as to the liability of certain parties for making up the same — Duke of Montrose, May 30, 1845. Found that a toll-bar cannot be legally erected within a royal burgh, and that xmder the Fife Turnpike Act, a General Trustee cannot vote at a district meet- ing, unless qualified within the district — Magistrates of Burntisland, 2d July 1845. INFERIOR COURTS. A merchant in Perth sends a common carter with potatoes to a mill a little in the country, bringing back the flour of potatoe, both his property. The carter was at first hired at so much each time, out and in, and subsequently at so much every day employed. The toll-man, in both ways, exacted toll at every passing, because, first, that the cart must be held as a cart conveying goods for pay under the 41st sect, of the General Turnpike Act ; or, second, that there must, be presumed to be a new hire on every change of load. The Sheriff- Substitute held — ls£, That the 41st sect, applied only to carriers’ carts, with a general cargo, and not to individual hiring ; and, 2d, That where the contents of the cart were on both occasions the property of the same individual, and on the same hire, that there could be no charge under the 42d section as on a change of hire, and decerned for repetitiorL~~A v. B, Sheriff Court of Perth, April 1846. Appeal from a district meeting to a general meeting of Road Trustees against the erection of nine new toll-bars — dismissed as informal, because not signed by three or more Trustees qualified in the district — Fife Road Trustees, 3d May 1845. After a litigation of nearly two years, the Sheriff of Lanarkshire found that there had been an illegal levy of tolls at the bars of Dalmarnock and Greenlees, toll being levied at both, whereas, by law, payment at the one cleared the other — Graham of Fereneze, June 1845. The toll-keeper at Baillieston toll, parish of Old Monkland, convicted at the instance of the Procurator-Fiscal, Hamilton, in a penalty of ten shillings, besides costs, for exacting toll upon cows driven daily through his toll to and from their pasture — August 1845. The treasurer to the Balmore Turnpike Trustees obtained a decemiture from the Sheriff of Stirlingshire for certain toll-duties, which were disputed by the defender, on the ground that the road was not turnpike, that the road had not been improved under the act, and that there was no toll-bar, toll-house, collec- tor’s-box, or table of rates. The defender appealed from the judgment to the Circuit Court, where the appeal was dismissed by Lord Moncreiff, on the ground, that by the 114th section of the General Turnpike Act the judgment of the Sheriff is declared to be final and conclusive, and not subject to review — Mackinlay, 13th October 1845. Note. — Under the Argyleshire act (referred to p. Ill) 6 and 7 Viet., c. 97 (1843), the roads are supported by assessments upon lands, houses, and other heritages, not exceed- ing 8d. nor less than 4d. on every pound of their real annual value— one-half payable by the landlord and the other by the tenant or occupier— and by an assessment of 4s. upon every person in the district who keeps a horse, provided such person be not otherwise assessed to that amount under this act. In case of sudden damage or of new roads being required, an additional assessment of 4d. is authorised. No performance of statute labour to be exacted in the county. 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