Letter XXVI. Concerning the New Roads, etc., 173-.

These new roads were begun in the year 1726, and have continued about eleven years in the prosecution; yet, long as it may be thought, if you were to pass over the whole work (for the borders of it would show you what it was), I make no doubt but that number of years would diminish in your imagination to a much shorter tract of time, by comparison with the difficulties that attended the execution.

But, before I proceed to any particular descriptions of them, I shall inform you how they lie, to the end that you may trace them out upon a map of Scotland; and first I shall take them as they are made, to enter the mountains, viz.—

One of them begins from Crief, which is about fourteen miles from Stirling: here the Romans left off their works, of which some parts are visible to this day, particularly the camp at Ardoch, where the vestiges of the fortifications are on a moor so barren, that its whole form has been safe from culture, or other alteration besides weather and time.

The other road enters the hills at Dimheld,[79] in Athol, which is about ten miles from Perth.

The first of them, according to my account, though the last in execution, proceeds through Glenalmond (which, for its narrowness, and the height of the mountains, I remember to have mentioned formerly), and thence it goes to Aberfaldy; there it crosses the river Tay by a bridge of free-stone, consisting of five spacious arches (by the way, this military bridge is the only passage over that wild and dangerous river), and from thence the road goes on to Dalnachardoch.

The other road from Dunkeld proceeds by the Blair of Athol to the said Dalnachardoch.

Here the two roads join in one, and, as a single road, it leads on to Dalwhinny, where it branches out again into two; of which one proceeds towards the north-west, through Garva Moor, and over the Coriarach mountain to Fort Augustus, at Killichumen, and the other branch goes due-north to the barrack of Ruthven, in Badenoch, and thence, by Delmagary, to Inverness. From thence it proceeds something to the southward of the west, across the island, to the aforesaid Fort-Augustus and so on to Fort-William, in Lochaber.

The length of all these roads put together is about two hundred and fifty miles....

In the summer seasons, five hundred of the soldiers from the barracks, and other quarters about the Highlands, were employed in those works in different stations, by detachments from the regiments and Highland companies.

The private men were allowed sixpence a day, over and above their pay as soldiers: a corporal had eight-pence, and a sergeant a shilling; but this extra pay was only for working-days, which were often interrupted by violent storms of wind and rain, from the heights and hollows of the mountains.

These parties of men were under the command and direction of proper officers, who were all subalterns, and received two shillings and sixpence per diem, to defray their extraordinary expence in building huts; making necessary provision for their tables from distant parts; unavoidable though unwelcome visits, and other incidents arising from their wild situation....

The standard breadth of these roads, as laid down at the first projection, is sixteen feet; but in some parts, where there were no very expensive difficulties, they are wider....

The old ways (for roads I shall not call them) consisted chiefly of stony moors, bogs, rugged, rapid fords, declivities of hills, entangling woods, and giddy precipices. You will say this is a dreadful catalogue to be read to him that is about to take a Highland journey. I have not mentioned the valleys, for they are few in number, far divided asunder, and generally the roads through them were easily made.

My purpose now is to give you some account of the nature of the particular parts above-mentioned, and the manner how this extraordinary work has been executed; and this I shall do in the order I have ranged them as above.

And first, the stony moors. These are mostly tracts of ground of several miles in length, and often very high, with frequent lesser risings and descents, and having for surface a mixture of stones and heath. The stones are fixed in the earth, being very large and unequal, and generally are as deep in the ground as they appear above it; and where there are any spaces between the stones, there is a loose spongy sward, perhaps not above five or six inches deep, and incapable to produce any thing but heath, and all beneath it is hard gravel or rock....

Here the workmen first made room to fix their instruments, and then, by strength, and the help of those two mechanic powers, the screw and the lever, they raised out of their ancient beds those massive bodies, and then filling up the cavities with gravel, set them up, mostly end-ways, along the sides of the road, as directions in time of deep snows, being some of them, as they now stand, eight or nine feet high. They serve, likewise, as memorials of the skill and labour requisite to the performance of so difficult a work....

Now that I have no further occasion for any distinction, I shall call every soft place a bog, except there be occasion sometimes to vary the phrase.

When one of these bogs has crossed the way on a stony moor, there the loose ground has been dug out down to the gravel, or rock, and the hollow filled up in the manner following, viz.—

First with a layer of large stones, then a smaller size, to fill up the gaps and raise the causeway higher; and, lastly, two, three, or more feet of gravel, to fill up the interstices of the small stones, and form a smooth and binding surface. This part of the road has a bank on each side, to separate it from a ditch, which is made without-side to receive the water from the bog, and, if the ground will allow it, to convey it by a trench to a slope, and thereby in some measure drain it....

The objections made to these new roads and bridges, by some in the several degrees of condition among the Highlanders, are in part as follow: viz.—

I. These chiefs and other gentlemen complain, that thereby an easy passage is opened into their country for strangers, who, in time, by their suggestions of liberty, will weaken that attachment of their vassals which it is so necessary for them to support and preserve. That their fastnesses being laid open, they are deprived of that security from invasion which they formerly enjoyed. That the bridges, in particular, will render the ordinary people effeminate, and less fit to pass the waters in other places where there are none. And there is a pecuniary reason concealed, relating to some foreign courts, which to you I need not explain.

II. The middling order say to them the roads are an inconvenience, instead of being useful, as they have turned them out of their old ways; for their horses being never shod, the gravel would soon whet away their hoofs, so as to render them unserviceable; whereas the rocks and moor-stones, though together they make a rough way, yet, considered separately, they are generally pretty smooth on the surface where they tread, and the heath is always easy to their feet....

III. The lowest class, who, many of them, at some times cannot compass a pair of shoes for themselves, they alledge, that the gravel is intolerable to their naked feet; and the complaint has extended to their thin brogues. It is true they do sometimes, for these reasons, go without the road, and ride or walk in very incommodious ways.

[79] Dunkeld.