Drive (road)

“ By the "travelled part" of the road is intended that part which is usually wrought for travelling, and not any track which may happen to be made in the road by the passing of vehicles; but when the wrought part of the road is hidden by the snow, and a path is beaten and travelled on the side of the wrought part, persons meeting on such beaten and travelled path are required to drive their vehicles to the right of the middle of such path.43 Many drivers of heavily loaded vehicles seem to think that all lightly loaded ones should turn out and give them all the travelled part of the road. ”

“ A mile in four minutes is too fast, [67] and if you go a mile in three minutes and ten seconds you become liable for all consequences. [68] Even where a man was driving at only a smartish pace and ran over a donkey he had to pay for it. [69] But one may drive rapidly on an open country road where the chance of collision is slight.”
“Look out, Eldon!” cried my gentle spouse. ”

“ You may get a horse and buggy at the stable, and drive over there. If I remember rightly, it is between little seven and eight miles. The road is a little winding, but I think you won't lose your way. ”

“ The long-drawn rural road I refer to, stretching over hill and dale and to which I devoted the whole of the longest day of the year—I was in a small single-horse conveyance, of which I had already made appreciative use, and with a driver as disposed as myself ever to sacrifice speed to contemplation—is doubtless familiar now with the rush of the motor-car ”

“ And as the picturesque trail is converted into the eminently modern and respectable macadamized road, the equally picturesque pack-train disappears and in its place we see, and smell, that emblem of the twentieth century, the automobile. ”

“ The most skillful driving did not prove skillful enough to guide the staggering oxen through the way provided by the road-makers; and the constant tendency of a forward wheel to run up a tree, on one side or the other, was very trying to the drivers. ”

“ The gradients have been well seen to, the road ascending by winding curves up the hillsides mostly by such easy stages as enable them to be traversed either on foot, in a carriage, motor-car, or even on a bicycle without much difficulty or fatigue. ”

“ Shut carriages, open carriages, motors of different sizes and makes, dog-carts, pony carriages, governess carts—on they came, one after another, stirring up the dust of the road till the air seemed full of a powdery mist, through which unhappy pedestrians ploughed along in the shadow of the hedgerows, their skirts held high in white-gloved hands. ”

“ People traverse it, not with the object of arriving at any particular destination, but for the delight of the road itself, of the joy it gives to the eye and to the imagination. Its only traffic is what the transport agent would call “holiday traffic”; for when the idle season ends the highway is deserted. In earlier days there would rumble along the road the carriage and four of the traveller of great means; then came the humbler vehicle hired from the town; then the sleek motor; and finally, as a sign of democratic progress, the char-à-banc, the omnibus, and the motor-brake. ”

“ The road is broad and smooth and level, and lies between low hedges, and has the straightness that the motorist loves; beyond the waving tamarisks a flat land of green and purple stretches away to the horizon; for the first time in many days the car speeds over the plain at the pace she loves best ”

“ There was quite enough, indeed, to engage the attention of any except the most blasé and ennuyée traveller, in the grandeur of the scenery and the excitement of being galloped in rocking, lumbering, four-horse coaches, down declivities of road which would have made a driver in any ordinary hill-country draw tight rein and creep down with a heavy foot on the brake. ”

“ The unfortunate motorist is perhaps ploughing his way steadily along through the gravel, dust, and sand. He encounters a barrier across the road bearing a notice that repairs are going on and that he must follow the detour indicated. The road selected, I believe, is generally the one with the most pot-holes, ruts, mountains, canyons, etc., in its formation in the surrounding district. ”

“ In passing such a light the eyes should be kept on the road and shielded, if possible, from the glare of the other machine. The precaution of driving slowly under such circumstances goes without saying.
Unlighted Vehicles. —Unlighted, horse-drawn vehicles, bicycles, and animals driven or walking in the street frequently give the automobile driver palpitation of the heart. ”

“ Some ten minutes’ driving, up a hill or two, while lamps grow less and less frequent, and we are out of the town, rolling along a road which is as good as an ordinary English turnpike-road—passing every now and then through spots of perfect darkness, where clumps of firs overhang the road on each side, and new again looking over a broad spread of water stretching away from our feet, with a row of distant wooded slopes appearing more and more clearly as the moon slowly rises. ”

“ Just at this moment, perhaps fortunately, for there is nothing so difficult to satisfy as the appetite of people for specific information, a motor-car whizzed past, the driver holding up his hand in greeting, and the road-worker and I responding in accordance with the etiquette of the Great Road.
“There he goes in the ruts again,” said the husky road-worker. “Why is it, I'd like to know, that every one wants to run in the same identical track when they've got the whole wide road before 'em?”
“That's what has long puzzled me, too,” I said. “Why WILL people continue to run in ruts?” ”

“ For those who would derive comfort from inhaling the pure, fresh air of the morning or evening in a drive, on horse-back or on a bicycle, can find on the avenue and boulevard beautifully graded drives, and a variety of scenes which are ever pleasing to the eye, while the beautiful sun risings and settings, and the deep blue sky above rival in grandeur and sublimity those of far-off Italy. ”

“ And if ever a driver needed to keep his head clear it was during this same descent; the road, a mere shelf in the rock, crawls along the precipitous mountainside while a vast abyss yawns below with a mad, boulder-vexed stream at the bottom. It was made far more trying to the nerves by the absence of trees or shrubbery to screen the precipice—a bare foot or two lay between our wheels and a sheer drop of say half a mile. ”

“ These, in driving, must always be a walk or a trot—never a canter, which, owing to the draught, would be equally injurious to the horse and to the carriage. Either of these paces, moreover, should be suited to the nature of the road. Rapid driving, on the stones especially, exposes a carriage to injury, both from shocks against others, and from those which attend its own motion. However, it is sometimes for a moment necessary, in order to get out of the way of carts, waggons, &c. ”

“ For the first few days driving either up or down steep hills must be avoided, but the work should consist in driving quietly about roads, teaching the colt to turn round, and also turn sharp angles into another road &c. ”

“ Frequently the wheels of a carriage would crunch along on the other side of the high wall, at times faint distant whistles would sound from the lake, and less frequently human voices would ring into the garden from the road along the bank. ”

“ We are, indeed, too much interested in the scenery to heed the frightful precipices within a few inches of our carriage-wheels. But the retrospection makes one giddy. The least accident or mishap, contingencies not dwelt upon whilst jogging on delightfully under a bright sky, might, or rather must, here end in a tragedy. Tourists should be quite sure of both driver and horses before undertaking this drive. ”

“ And indeed what does the price matter, if the trick be well done? You do your tricks very well. And I didn't do badly either, since I managed not to sink that steamboat on my first trip. It's a wonder to me yet. Imagine a blindfolded man set to drive a van over a bad road. ”

“ A road should be easy going for motors, horses, and foot-passengers. Easy and safe.”
“How would you do it?”
“A raised causeway for walkers; a road for carriages, and a track for motors. It only means so many yards more and there is plenty of land. Look at that turf—four yards of it. Might as well be road.”
“What are you going to make your roads of?”
Christopher took a deep breath; the pace of the car increased a little. ”

“ The carriage-road is equally alive, with people riding and driving along; farmers and country gentlemen, country clergymen, parish overseers, and various other personages, drawn to the market-town by some real or imagined business, are rattling forward on horseback, or in carriages of various kinds, gigs, and spring-carts, and carts without springs. ”

“ As it was, an automobilist journeys along the road—which is practically across the kingdom—his eyes glued to it, his heart in his mouth, and he bumps and slides over the wearying kilometres until he all but forgets the beauties of the Meuse now so far behind. Kilometre after kilometre of this vile road is paved with blocks of stone as big as one's head, half of which are out of place. And when one's automobile sinks into the holes one can but shudder. One hears of a road that is paved with good intentions. ”

“ But when a carriage is drawn or impelled along a hard and level road, the motion which it receives from the first impulse would continue undiminished for a short time, if the road and the faces of the wheels were perfectly smooth, and no resistance of the air. ”

“ The road may be rough, roundabout, and steep, without precluding wholesome and hearty happiness; but if one wheel drags while the other turns, if one goes back while the other goes forward, if for any reason the two do not move by parallel lines in the same direction, the whole carriage is bewitched, the whole journey is embittered, the whole object is baffled. ”

“ When it is remembered that motor-cars have come upon the roads since then, that innumerable sporting “records” in cycling, walking, and other forms of progression have since been made, and that in many other ways the road is different, it was seen that not merely a re-issue of the book, but a book almost entirely re-written and re-illustrated was required. ”

“ All vehicles, riders, etc., coming in the opposite direction, therefore, must be passed on the right, and on crowded roads, particularly in parks and on the streets or avenues of the city, the driver should habitually keep to the right of the middle of the road. ”

“ When, as is commonly the case now, it is nearly all single horse work, the wheels and the horses always keep to the same tracks, and the new metal requires constant raking to prevent the road getting into ruts; whereas, with a variety in the traffic, the stone settles with little trouble. ”

“ The road was wide enough for the carriage and no more; soft as a carpet, so that the wheels made no noise, with big trunks of pines, palmettoes, oaks, sweet-gums, magnolias, [143] and what not crowding upon the track so closely that we could almost put out our hands and touch them as we passed. In the whole distance, to the best of my recollection, we met neither carriage nor foot-passenger. ”

“ In an ordinary road is the impression of the wheel of a Stage Coach upon the solid surface of the road so great as to make the injury apparent every time the Carriage passes over it?—It is apparent to me, because wherever there is a mark upon the road there is a consequent injury. ”

“ For mile after mile I now alternately ride and trundle along donkey-paths, by the side of an artificial highway that would be an enterprise worthy of a European State. The surface of the road is either gravelled or of broken rock, and well rounded for self-drain- age; it is graded over the mountains, and wooden bridges, with substantial rock supports, are built across the streams; nothing is lacking except the vehicles to utilize it. ”

“ Our road lay for a time along the sea, and then inland, always mounting up into the heart of the mountains, by long, green valleys and over desolate plateaux where flocks of sheep and goats grazed under the guardianship of wild-looking shepherds and fierce dogs, the latter violently resenting the intrusion of the car into their fastnesses. ”

“ If at a less distance still, no inconvenience will result; for when either of them takes over an obstacle in the road, it instantly, and during the need, discharges its respective active wheel from the ground, and works in its stead. ”

“ One can back around a street corner with his trailer in the rear without great difficulty, but to back one down a stretch of crooked mountain road to a turn-out so that a descending car may pass him would be beyond the power of the ordinary driver. ”

“ In modern times, notwithstanding the sneers directed against gentlemen-coachmen and driving-clubs, it is to them chiefly that this country is indebted for the present excellent state of the roads, and for safe and expeditious travelling. The taste for driving produced, between men of property and those connected with the road, an intercourse which has been productive of the best results. ”

“ The views on every side were of course continually enlarging and expanding the higher the carriage ascended, and as, in the long windings and zigzags of the road, the heads of the horses were turning continually into different directions, each person in the carriage, without changing his seat, or even turning his head, had all the different views presented successively before him. ”

“ It was soon evident that my friend's ideas of driving probably coincided with his ideas of going up a mountain. When a mounted cowboy climbs a hill he does not believe in fussing with such nonsense as grades; he goes straight up. Similarly, this man evidently considered that, as roads were made for travel and distance for annihilation, one should turn on full speed and get there. Not one hair's breadth did he deign to swerve for chuck-hole or stone; not one fractional mile per hour did he check for gully or ditch. ”