cates the rudeness of these early roads: "The highways to be cleared as followeth, viz., the way to be made clear of standing and lying trees, at least ten feet broad; all stumps and shrubs to be cut close by the ground. The trees marked yearly on both sides—sufficient bridges to be made and kept over all marshy, swampy, and difficult dirty places, and whatever else shall be thought more necessary about the highways aforesaid."
In Pennsylvania, under Penn, the grand jury laid out the roads, and the courts appointed overseers and fence-viewers, but in 1692 the townships were given the control of the roads. Eight years later the county roads were put in the hands of the county justices, and king's highways in the hands of the governor and his council. Each county was ordered to erect railed bridges at its expense over rivers, and to appoint its own overseers and fence-viewers.
Even the slightest mention of these laws and regulations misrepresents the exact situation. Up to the time of the Revolutionary War it can almost be said that nothing had been done toward what we today
