■2IS
Geo. II.), the Commissioners of supply * are conjoined withthem, (probably in the view, that, from enlarging its basis, therewould be less danger of combination for purposes of mutual pri.vate accommodation). These administrators are enjoined to holdtwo general yearly meetings; one in spring, 30th of April, (whenthe Commissioners of Supply lay the county assessment for theland-tax), and the other at Michaelmas. These meetings areempowered to provide, that all highways are of proper breadth,(in early times, by statute, forty feet, subsequently reduced totwenty, clear of the drains on both sides); to prevent injuries tothem, to remove hedges where necessary, See.
The fund provided for making roads, by these enactments,is a certain number of days’ labour from the occupiers of thelands, upon those parts of the public roads which run throughthe parishes where they reside. This is called the statute labour,(from being enjoined by statute); and a similar provision, formaking roads, seems very generally to have been adopted, andto have been, in many countries, a source of great oppression.!Our enactments have guarded against all arbitrary exactions,having strictly limited the extent of the service, and restrictedthe time of its exaction to the least inconvenient season. Thenumber of days is limited to six yearly, viz. three before the lastday of June, and three after harvest, and to Jour days in tkyear thereafter ,—a clause which seems to imply, that, after anyperson has once given six days’~labour, he is ever after liable on-ly in four yearly. Originally, this obligation extended only totenants and their cottars, who were to appear with their carts,horses, and implements, but was afterwards extended to all theinhabitants. Heritors are not liable in statute-labour,—an ex-ception for which there seems no good reason ; but in case of itsdeficiency they are empowered (and undoubtedly power dele-gated ever implies an obligation to use it, for the purpose forwhich it is given, unless the purpose is such as suits only theviews of a barbarous age) to assess the landed interest, at a ge-neral meeting of heritors and freeholders, to be held yearly uponthe first Tuesday of June, to an extent not exceeding 10s. Scots on every 100/. Scots of valued rent,—an assessment which, fro*the universally experienced deficiency of the statute-labour, it isprobable, was soon imposed over Scotland , and continues to belevied, under the name of road and bridge money.
* Landed property of 100/. Scots of valuation, is the qualification for be*#Commissioner of Supply. Justices of the Deace hold their office from tl'°King's commission solely.
f Young, in his travels through France , takes notice of the great oppress! 0 "»f the corvee , or statute-labour,—valleys needlessly filled up, at prodigious el*ponsc, and prodigality of labour,—and wanton sacrifices of private property