II
Of course the road never really lost its national importance. It was only that the quickness of railway travelling and the slowness of horse-transport made the road suffer a temporary eclipse—though while it lasted of a very complete kind. The old lawyers declared that title deeds were 'the nerves and sinews of the land.' In a very much more striking and real way the roads are 'the nerves and sinews of the land.' It is they that bind village to village, and town to town, and thread the centres of population as beads are threaded on a string. A moment's reflection will show the vast importance of the part that has been, and must always be, played by roads in our national life. Though the country is covered by a network of railways, we do not, unless we are station-masters, live on the railways. The road is, as it were, the first wife of the nation, and though some sixty years ago the husband took a new wife home, he never discarded the first, and she has in reality always remained nearest to him, and has always held his home. Nothing can take that away from her. We live on the roads, and they are part and parcel of our daily lives. We look down the road for the home-comer, or the new-comer. Our gates open on the road. The road is always with us. The motor-car and the bicycle have restored to us a full remembrance of the fact. While railway travelling was so immeasurably quicker and easier than road travelling, we were forced to give up the pleasure our fathers had taken in the road, for mankind in general cannot or will not lose time. Now, however, the road has been revived. To go back to the marital and polygamous metaphor, just employed, the motor-car has given the road a crown of price that has once again made her find favour in the eyes of her lord and master. The second wife has come to look old-fashioned and dull, and the first wife, never really rejected, renews her claims. No one can deny that from the point of view of beauty this
