alighted on a very cold day at an inn where the author was, when taking out his handkerchief to wipe his nose, he pulled off the tip, like a piece of ice. The author says the company could with great difficulty prevent him from clapping a pistol to his head in a fit of despair, but they at last succeeded in persuading him that it was possible to be happy even without a nose."

The English Traveller.

ROADS.

(Resumed from page 2.) EVERY inconvenience of this description the turnpike road was to cure. I know that, before 1755, there was no symptom of any thing like a turnpike between Winchester and Southampton, and that when it came to be set about, the improvement was as efficacious as it was incredible. A few months completely altered the face of the country. It was the old ground young. Every thing wore a new aspect; and those chalky bottoms about Winchester, which had been at times impassable, and those slippery declivities, through which travellers climbed with so much difficulty over St. Giles's and Magdalen hills, in the way to Alresford, soon wore the appearance of a sober and gradual ascent, scarcely perceptible to the traveller. The traces of early recollection, should the objects be worthy attention, are strengthened rather than obliterated by time; a public benefit, therefore, of such magnitude, achieved as it were by magic, had a forcible effect on my youthful imagination; and, as far as my maturer judgment has given me capacity to notice, it has always occurred to ine that no undertaking was ever prosecuted with more public spirit, or fraught with more public advantage. The canals are another object of great national consequence; and, though they do not properly come under observation here, I cannot refrain from noticing how nobly they conduce to our commercial opulence. Not a single reason can be given why the turn pike roads throughout the kingdom should not be safe and pleasant; large suins are lavished for the purpose; expence may be commanded adequate to

all emergencies; and this expence by law is levied on the public. Surveyors are required and enjoined to lay out all the monies collected, solely to repair the roads. Where a sufficient quantity of stone, gravel, chalk, or other materials cannot easily be obtained, they are commanded to contract for them; and if in this they have any private interest, they incur a penalty. They are obliged to furnish foot causeways; and, that the work may be properly accelerated, heaps of stones, rubbish, or other materials, are not to remain undispersed more than four days. Variety of other injunctions held out by this act, clearly shew that there cannot be a single excuse for neglect of this description, and no man in his senses will so far expose himself, as to offer a plea for such dishonesty and mismanagement. I am not to learn, nay, I am forward to allow, that spirited individuals go great lengths for public accommodation; but the money is subscribed; it gets into the hands of treasurers, and from thence takes so many collateral branches, that it is at length sifted like meal. By this means, abuses creep in, and what was intended in the beginning for a noble and useful urdertaking, degenerates into a job. Turnpikes are farmed out and commuted for. These are the loop-holes through which all the corruption insinuates itself. I have many worthy reasons to love and respect the inhabitants of Devonshire; but I shall ever execrate the roads in that county, at least those in the north, which are shamefully neglected; the injustice of which conduct I shall make sufficiently, manifest, by instancing, that those in Cornwall, with less capability, are more safe and pleasant. The practicability of rendering roads easy and convenient, that were originally difficult and dangerous, is clearly proved by a description of those in Scotland, which, though formerly rugged and inaccessible, have, by a laudable spirit and indefatigable perseverance, become, I should apprehend, the best in Europe; nor are those in Cumberland and Westmoreland far behind hand. Is it not a shame then, that in almost the centre of England, in a country marked by industry and

opulence, where natural impediments do not exist, where the breed of cattle is so largely encouraged, where every acre of ground smiles with plenty and fertility, in Leicestershire and Northamptonshire, that roads are to be met with which are a national disgrace? I cannot resist such an opportunity of instancing a most glaring confirmation of this fact. had occasion to travel from Huntingdon to Leicester, and I was informed that I might go by Stilton, Stamford, Oakham, and Uppingham, or St. Neot's and Higham Ferrers, both of which I knew to be bad roads. I therefore chose that which passes through Thrapstone, Kettering, and Harborough, and which was represented to me as the best of the three. I found it, however, the most dangerous I ever attempted. The worst parts of those in Cornwall, where, from the nature of the materials, the suddden declivities, the unexpected moulderings of the rocks, the undermined masses of large roots, and other obstructions, which it requires the atmost industry to surmount, would, in point of safety, shame these roads, where no national impediments occur. This remark applies to a part of the road between Thrapstone and Kettering, and the whole of that between Kettering and Harborough; the neglect of which is the more scandalous, because the road from Huntingdon to Thrapstone, where the materials are exactly the same, is perfectly safe and pleasant The danger from this abominable road is the prodigious depth of the ruts; and in the midst of your apprehensions you are called upon for a toll; and, though you are informed that the road will be worse as you get on, there is a pompous display of the only terms on which you are permitted to pass. Thus was I compelled either to risk my neck, or walk five miles (indeed, it was every where dangerous), over a road the caricatureof ploughed ground, and all this to accommodate a set of men who undertake a public office, and neither fulfil the trust themselves nor suffer others to do it for them. As I passed through the gate, I told the woman, with an appearance of

gravity and earnestness, that I would certainly indict the road, to which she answered, with an air of perfect simplicity, "I wish to God you would, sir, and then I might stand a chance of saving up my rent."--(Concluded on page 18.)

IN NS. (Resumed from page 3.) AT Matlock I had trout brought be fore me completely tainted, though, with five minutes trouble, they might have procured them fresh out of the water. This circumstance so possessed me, that, when I dined at Boness, in Westmoreland, and was told that we might either have trout or char, I very roundly interrogated the woman as to their being fresh. "Fresh," said she, with great simplicity, "it's loikely, I dinna knaw; they binna caught yet.` I don't know how I came to ask the question, for always found representation and remonstrance of no other avail than to add insolence to imposition, and upon that account, I have since paid the bill without manifesting any objection, upon the principle of the man, who said he made a point of never affronting a highwayman or a barber, for one held a pistol to his head, and the other a razor to his throat. I never refused to pay a single item in a bill of this description but once. I have submitted to sit in filth, to wait till I have been sick, and at last to get nothing eatable at an inn at Fareham (the apology for an alehouse at Wapping), at the same expence for which I had the day before been lodged handsomely, attended diligently, and served plentifully, at the George, at Winchester. I have paid sixpence a mile for post horses more than the customary charge; and, indeed, I could mention a hundred more impositions of a similar complexion which I have quietly suffered. I know not, therefore, how I came to be moved to resistance in the instance I allude to; but I believe it was owing to the complexion of the bill, which I had, as I run my eye over it, remarked in every circumstance to have been most shamefully overrated. The article I mean was