And so on for a column or more. She inserts by way of anecdote which shows that two of the greatest Germans who ever lived did not think the lowly road too insignificant to discuss: When Heinrich Heine for the first time met with the royal poet, Goethe, he was so impressed with the majesty of his personality that he could speak of nothing less than the plum trees on the chaussée, between Jena and Weimar. Also Bill Nye, the humorist, takes a rap at the roads in this manner.[128] Our wagon roads throughout the country are generally a disgrace to civilization and before we undertake to supply Jaeger underwear and sealskin covered bibles with flexible backs to the African it might be well to put a few dollars into the relief of galled and broken down horses that have lost their breath on our miserable highways. The country system, as I recall it, was in my boyhood about as poor and inefficient as it could well be. Each township was divided up into road districts, and each road district was presided over by an overseer of highways, whose duty it is to collect so many days’ work or so many dollars from each taxpayer in the district. Of course no taxpayer would pay a dollar when he could come and make mud pies on the road all day and visit and gossip with the neighbors and save his dollar too. The result seemed to be that the work was misdirected and generally an injury to the road. With all our respect to the farmer, I will state right here that he does not know how to make roads. An all wise Providence never intended that he should know. The professional roadbuilder, with the money used by the ignorant sapheads and self-made road architects, would in a few years make roads in the United States over which two or three times the present sized load could be easily drawn, and the dumb beasts of the Republic would rise up and call us blessed for doing it. This bit of doggerel appeared in _Good Roads_ about the same time: _They May Be Sinking Yet_ Old farmer John drove off to town All on a rainy day. The glistening highway up and down, With mire shone all the way. The gentle weeping raindrops fell And had fallen all the night; The bottom of that highway--well; ’Twas literally out of sight. But John had hitched his sturdy steeds. His sturdy steeds and true That often ’mid such urgent needs. Had boldly struggled through. And John had sworn a big round oath With deep and bated breath, He’d rather brave the deep, forsooth, Thrice o’er than starve to death. For visions of the flour bin, ’Twas empty he could see, And for a week no sugar in His coffee cup had he. And so amid the sea of mire. Those steeds right valiant reel, While turbid waves creep higher, higher, Upon the wagon wheel.