Royal road

“ The roads are almost impassable. The carriages of the nobility and gentry infinitely worse than the stage-coaches in England; and the inns want all the accommodations they are intended for.
You may easily imagine that the sight of a new queen, from the position of the kingdom to the capital, brought upon my passage great crowds of people from the adjacent towns and villages, yet I believe you may see more on a fair day from Charing Cross to the Royal Exchange than I have met upon the road from Altona to Copenhagen. ”

“ There is no denying that there are "royal roads" through existence for the upper classes; for them, at least, the highways are macadamized, swept, and watered. They are surrounded not only by luxuries, but by pleasures, which, at all events to the young, must have the zest of novelty. ”

“ The highways of the present day, radiating from London and the other large centres of industry, and extending their arms to every corner of the land, are wellnigh perfect in their kind, and present a picture of careful and efficient maintenance. Whether we look, for example, at the great north road leading from London, the Carlisle to Glasgow road, or the Highland road passing through Dunkeld, we find the roads have certain features in common: a broad hard roadway for vehicles ”

“ The newest street in London town, The Kingsway, the Kingsway! The newest street in London town, Who’ll pace it up and pace it down? The brave, the strong, who strive and try, And think and work, who fight and die To make their England’s royal way The King’s Way, the King’s Way!
The noblest street in London town, The Kingsway, the Kingsway! The noblest street in London town, The stir of life beats up and down; In serried ranks the sabres shine, And Art and Craft and Thought divine, All crowd and fill the great highway, The Kingsway, the Kingsway! ”

“ Have you ever, as a child, looking, large-eyed and a little frightened it may be, out upon the bigness of London, wondered where the houses ended and Gods own country began, or asked where the last house of the last street looked out upon the meadows, and the final flag-stone led on to the footpath of the King's Highway? ”

“ One of the charms of old England is to be found in her numerous foot-paths and green lanes, which are recognized by law, for many of them are older than the highways. When a walker tires of the public road or is in a hurry, if he knows the country, he can turn into some foot-path and reach the place of his destination by short cuts through green lanes, across pleasant meadows, and along shady hedgerows. ”

“ It is not given to all alike to be able to appreciate the true pleasure of a country walk. It is a thing that many of us prize, and that even more of us long for. And yet there are some people, really fond of walking, to whom it seems to make little difference whether their road goes evenly along the Queen's highway, and is hemmed in by straight stone walls, or loiters through winding by-ways, under banks crowned with straggling hedge-rows, overhung with sheltering elms. ”

“ The roads have an expansion that agrees with the idea of a large luxurious city, and with the beauty of the buildings in the noble square, that first attracts the travellers eye. The lofty trees on each side of the road, forming charming alleys, in which the people walk and lounge with an easy gaiety peculiar to the nation, seem calculated equally to secure their health and promote their pleasure. The barriers, likewise, are stately edifices, that tower with grandeur, rendering the view, as the city is approached, truly picturesque. ”

“ I envy him his care-free way, I envy him his smile,
The highway is his own domain, he rules it every mile;
The king who drives about by day, sends couriers on ahead
And buglers gay and soldiers brave, a path for him to spread;
But he may go his way alone nor fear that he'll be struck,
For monarch of the highway is the driver of the truck.
When I go driving down the road I must obey the rules,
I must watch out for all who come, the sane men and the fools,
And I must guard that car of mine with vigilance and care,
For even trifling accidents might strand me then and there ”

“ On the other hand, wherever the great Roman Empire stepped, it engineered mighty thoroughfares which are a marvel to this day. A road is the thread on which the beads of history are strung; the beads of peace as well as those of war. ”

“ The highway itself stands as a memorial of the most venerable customs and the most ancient races. As I lift my eyes from its beaten road-bed, and look out upon it through the imagination, it escapes all later boundaries and runs back through history to the very dawn of civilisation; it marks the earliest contact of men with a world which was wrapped in mystery. The hour that saw a second home built by human hands heard the first footfall on the first highway. ”

“ Driving or walking along the high road—the road the Romans had built to London town long centuries ago—on either side of one were meadows, farms, scattered cottages, and hop gardens, but beyond and below stretched the marsh land, golden and grey, and always alluring one by its silence. ”

“ There is no finer road in England than that leading from Cambridge to Newmarket. It is nearly level, and having been newly surfaced with yellow gravel, it stretches before us like a long golden ribbon in the sunshine. It leads through wide meadow-lands and at times runs straight away as an arrow’s flight—truly a tempting highway for the light-footed motor car. ”

“ The twelfth century was the moment when civilization was arising again everywhere throughout the west, and nowhere more strongly than Britain. That was true of the architecture and town life and education, and of letters, and, we may justly presume, of the road system as well. ”

“ The study of any highway for itself alone might prove of indifferent value, even though it were an Appian Way; but the story of a road, which shows clearly the rise, nature, and passing of a nation's need for it, is of importance. ”

“ The roads are as level as the floor of your parlor; a much more direct footpath, resembling the neatest gravel-walk in your garden, conducts pedestrians to the same places.
Wherever you find a beautiful spot, with a commanding sight, there you will find a bench and one or more oak chairs, where you may rest yourself and enjoy the landscape at your ease. Even on the road for carriages a space is left for turning or halting wherever a commanding view presents itself to the eye. In this careful treasuring up of the wealth of nature, the Germans have no equal in Europe. ”

“ It lay out of the beaten track, and any one wanting to visit it must needs climb the long winding road that led from the plain beneath, through olive groves and sheepfields, up to the city gate—a steep, difficult road, leading nowhere but to the little town itself. ”

“ Harper sadly says, ‘the Brighton of to-day is no place for the travel-worn;’ but, with his book in hand, the pedestrian, the horseman, the coachman, or the cyclist, may find the road that leads to it from town one of the most interesting and entertaining stretches of highway to be found anywhere.”—Daily Chronicle. ”

“ Thus the great Roman roads, connecting the rising city on the Thames and the commercial centre of Britain with every part of the island, were remarkable, not only because they represented an art which was to disappear with the conquerors themselves, but, also, because they had been directly created, and were directly controlled, by a central authority as the outcome of a State road policy itself fated in turn to disappear no less effectually. ”

“ Roads so straight that they might have been cut with a knife, breaking away at the villages round which they make rectilinear patterns, like the petals of meagre flowers. The English country road is less rational and less sensible, but much more shady and companionable. ”

“ One of our great material blessings is the outstanding network of roads and highways that spreads across this vast continent. Freedom of travel and the romance of the road are vital parts of our heritage, and they helped to make America great. Four million miles of streets and roads make it possible for the average citizen to drive to virtually every corner of our country—to enjoy America in all its beauty and variety. ”

“ Of course an old foot-path in this country always serves to mark the line of a new road when the people who had worn it take to keeping horses. But there are thousands of miles of paths criss-crossing the countryside in all of our older States that will never see the dirt-cart or the stone-crusher in the lifetime of any man alive to-day. ”

“ The general impression is that the English people then underwent one of those profound transformations which present themselves to the historian’s view like the turning of a highway. Coming out from gorges and mountains the road suddenly leads to an opening, and the rich, sunny, fertile plain is perceived in the distance. ”

“ This is from economy, for roads are excessively expensive both to make and to keep up in England. There is generally but one carriage-road to the house, and even the footpaths cease with the iron fences of the pleasure-grounds. The English ladies are not so afraid of setting their feet on wet grass as ours are.
After many windings, the path brought me, under a most lovely leafy canopy, unexpectedly before the ivy-covered door of a little building, adjoining to which, still more buried in the wood, was the gamekeeper’s house. ”

“ A French road, like a mathematical line, on, and on, and on, straight, straight, mournfully, dismally, straight, running like a tape laid across the bleak bare country, till it fades, and fades, and seems to tip over the horizon; or if you are in an undulating wooded district, you catch sections of it as it climbs each successive ridge ”

“ The old roads and their romance are the heritage of the modern tourist, by whatever method he likes to explore them. Countless generations of men have built up the highways, the cities, towns, villages and hamlets along their course, and have lived and loved, have laboured, fought and died through the centuries. ”

“ Of all roads in the world it is the dreamer's road, luring on the wayfarer with perpetual romantic promise and surprise, winding on and on, one can well believe, into the very heart of fairy-land. Everything beautiful seems to be waiting for us somewhere in the turnings of an English lane.
Had I sat down to write of the English countryside two years ago, I should have done so with a certain amount of cautious skepticism. I should have said to myself: "You have not visited England for over ten years. ”

“ Outside the Palace, the road—there is now a road where there was once a marsh or shallow with a ford—is covered with an endless procession of those who make their way to the Palace and the Abbey with supplies. ”

“ How different from an English road, which winds around the hills in soft and graceful sweeps, avoiding deep valleys or reverend trees, instead of following the one inveterate idea of a straight line, at a sixfold cost, through thick and thin, over hill and valley. ”

“ The High Road from London to Brighton that ran through Bun Hill was like the British Empire or the British Constitution—a thing that had grown to its present importance. Unlike any other roads in Europe the British high roads have never been subjected to any organised attempts to grade or straighten them out, and to that no doubt their peculiar picturesqueness is to be ascribed. ”

“ WAY, the Early English name of a Roman road or series of roads in Britain, used later by the English, running from Lincoln by Leicester and Bath to Exeter. Almost all the Roman line is still in use as modern road or lane. ”

“ That is true, no doubt, of all western countries, but it is especially true of England. The English road system is the product in every age of the great Roman scheme, the relics of which are more marked in England than they are anywhere else in the world. ”

“ There were four or five correspondents, of whom I was one, allowed to travel with the King. We had one of the royal motor cars, and wherever the King drove, we followed next to his equerries and officers. It was an astonishing experience, for we were part of the royal procession and in the full tide of that immense, clamorous enthusiasm of vast and endless crowds which awaited the King’s coming. Our eyes tired of the triumphal arches, floral canopies, flag-covered cities and hamlets, through which we passed, and of those turbulent waves of human faces pressing close to our carriage. ”

“ Meanwhile, dividing the two cantons, the broad white causeway of the Paris road runs in an avenue: a road conceived for pageantry and for triumphal marches, an avenue for an army; but, its days of glory over, it now lies grilling in the sun between cool groves, and only at intervals the vehicle of the cruising tourist is seen far away, and faintly audible along its ample sweep. A little upon one side, and you find a district of sand and birch and boulder ”

“ There is one straight avenue in front, but the principal carriage-road has just the kind of curve most desirable, sweeping round some fine trees which group themselves for the purpose of affording an agreeable diversity. ”

“ The desire of the people for the speedy opening of this great national highway is manifested by the action of the government, which, by act of Congress, July 2, 1864, granted the alternate sections of land for twenty miles on each side of the road in aid of the enterprise. ”

“ Thus every traveller on a country road is surrounded by monuments more ancient, more impressive, and more beautiful than the ancient or modern world can show as the production of human hands.
He finds much enjoyment in the study of the forms and characteristics of the different trees by the wayside. If the road passes over highland, on a breezy day he can look down upon or across the tops of undulating forest trees, whose swaying movements remind him of the waves of the sea. ”