The importance of a good road, protected by military posts at short intervals, in securing the tranquillity of a turbulent district, is strikingly shewn in another instance. That part of the great highway between Madrid and Cadiz which crosses the wild hills of the Sierra barrier, was formerly left to the robber and the wolf, without roads or villages. A road, admirably planned, was at length executed by Charles Le Maur, an able engineer in the service of Charles III. The task of guarding it was the difficulty next to be overcome. For this purpose, Spain, who had colonized the new world, and expelled her rich Jews and industrious Moors, was compelled to resort to foreign assistance. In 1768, a colony of Germans and Swiss settled upon the line on condition of maintaining a constant guard.[[36]] This is done to the present day. Several consecutive towns, such as Carolina, in Andalusia, are occupied by people speaking nothing but the German language, and regular patrols are constantly on the move from one town to another. These Germans have their land in better order and cultivation than the Spaniards. This Spanish highway, with its stations at regular intervals, with its foreign guards, who from generation to generation maintain the tongue and the habits of their fatherland, presents too many points of resemblance to the manner in which the northern frontier of Roman power in Britain was defended, to be passed over without obtaining at least this brief notice.
MILITARY ROADS.
Gordon, in his Itinerarium Septentrionale, says, that two military ways belonged to the Barrier; a small Military Way a little to the south of the Wall, and, beyond it, the Great Military Way. In addition to these, Horsley enumerates a third, which he calls the Old Military Way. Horsley conceives that the north rampart of the Vallum constitutes the road which was used by Agricola and Hadrian in transporting their troops from station to station, and that when Severus built the Wall, he formed a new road—the great military way—which pursued an independent course, sometimes coinciding with the old road, but more frequently keeping nearer to the Wall. That there may have been a path-way immediately under the Wall which went from turret to turret, on which the Roman sentries marched with slow and measured pace, when they did not choose to expose themselves upon the parapets of the Wall, is not improbable; though we now look in vain for any traces of it. But that the north agger of the Vallum was thrown up either by Agricola or Hadrian to serve the purposes of a road, is a proposition too startling to be received even on the authority of the learned Horsley. In some places, indeed, it is sufficiently flattened to admit of the passage of traffic along it, but in the greater part of the course where the works of the Vallum are not under cultivation, the rampart is too conical, too narrow, and too ragged, to admit of such a use. Excepting in those situations, where stones are mingled with the whole mass of the agger, it exhibits no signs of having been paved.[[37]] The manner in which all the ramparts of the Vallum on Tepper Moor are encumbered with blocks of basalt, clearly shews, that here at least there has been no road. Besides, few who trace the lines of the Vallum from sea to sea, and observe their complete parallelism, will be able to resist the conclusion, that the whole of the works were contemporaneous; whereas, Horsley’s theory ascribes part to Agricola, and part to Hadrian: moreover, it may be added, that so much do the northern and the southernmost aggers resemble each other, that unbiassed observers will scarcely entertain a doubt, that they have been thrown up to serve a precisely similar purpose.
THE MILITARY WAY.
Happily, there is no room for doubt respecting the other road, which Horsley calls Severus’ Greater Military Way, as in the untilled districts of the country it may be traced for several consecutive miles; and if we receive the theory, that the Murus and Vallum are one work, there is no need to seek for any other.
CONSTRUCTION OF THE ROAD.
The Military Way is usually about seventeen feet wide, and is composed of rubble so arranged as to present a rounded surface, elevated in its centre a foot or eighteen inches above the adjoining ground. When carried along the slope of a hill, the hanging side is made up by large kerb-stones. In most places where it still remains, it is completely grass-grown, but may, notwithstanding, be easily distinguished from the neighbouring ground by the colour of its herbage, the dryness of its substratum allowing the growth of a finer description of plant. For the same reason, a sheep-track generally runs along it. For the accommodation of the soldiery, the road went from castle to castle, and so, from station to station. In doing this, it did not always keep close to the Wall, but took the easiest path between the required points. In traversing the precipitous grounds between Sewingshields and Thirlwall, the ingenuity of the engineer has been severely tried; but most successfully has he performed his task. Whilst, as previously observed, the Wall shoots over the highest and steepest summits, the road pursues its tortuous course from one platform of the rock to another, so as to bring the traveller from mile-castle to mile-castle by the easiest possible gradients. Often has it been my lot to notice how naturally, towards the close of a fatiguing day’s march, the less zealous of our exploring party, more anxious to select an easy track than to keep close companionship with the Wall, have, most unconsciously, pursued the route of the Roman way. But, notwithstanding all the art of the engineer, the steepness of the road in some places is such, that most of our modern carmen, with all their boasted skill, would be greatly puzzled if required to traverse it with a waggon laden with military stores.[[38]]
ADDITIONAL ROAD.
Although the road now described has probably been the only carriage-way between the two great lines of fortification, another, situated to the south of them, has afforded direct communication between some of the inland stations. From Cilurnum to Magna, the Wall forms a curved line, in order to gain the highest hills of the district. For the accommodation of those whose business did not require them to call at any intermediate point, a road went, like the string of a bow, direct from the one station to the other. This road, which is shewn in [Plate II]., went near the modern village of Newburgh, where Roman remains are occasionally found, and passed by the north gate of Vindolana, Chesterholm, near to which a Roman mile-stone still stands. Some portions of the ancient pavement still remain near Morwood. It is probable that this Roman Military Way was further continued, south of the Wall, direct to Stanwix.
SPEAKING TUBES IN THE WALL.