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PREFACE.

pass over a highway or a bridge, and the lighters and bargeswhich are used upon a navigable canal, pav toll in proportion totheir weight or their tonnage, they pay for the maintaining thosepublic works in proportion to the wear and tear which they occa-lion. A more equitable way of maintaining such works cannotbe found ; for the tax or toll, though advanced by the carrier, isfinally paid by the consumer, to whom it is charged in the priceof his goods. Canals, roads, and bridges, consequently must bemade where there is trade to support them. In several parts ofEurope the toll, or lock-duties on a canal, is the property of someprivate person, whose interest obliges him to keep it in proper re-pair; if not, the navigation ceases, and with it his prosit: his princi-pal, as well as interest, is therefore at stake. There is this differ-ence between a high road and a canal; the road, if neglected, andsuffered to fall to decay, is not entirely impassable ; whereas acanal is. When a navigable canal has been once made, the ma-nagement of it becomes quite simple and easy; and with respectto the making, it is reducible to strict rule and method: it maybe contracted for with undertakers at so much per mile, and somuch per lock : such undertakings therefore may be, and ac-cordingly frequently are, very successfully managed by joint-stock companies.

Gcoi roads, canals, and navigable rivers, by diminishing theexpence of carriage, put the remote parts of the country moreupon a level with those in the neighbourhood of large towns;they are, on that account, the greatest of all improvements. They

encourage