View report page

18
year by year, and are really instructive; supposing the
Five and Twenty Reports already published were taken
seriatim, the works as stated in the present list would
then, that is in 1856, have been considered chimerical
and any proposer of such, might have had his sanity
considered rather doubtful.
The progress thus reported really amounts to a
gradual development of wants long recognized, and by
degrees become to be tangible facts, capable of
actual accomplishment; it is needless to remind the
Vestry of the amount of detail involved in bringing about
any actual novelty; when such is really done there is not
much surprise further than a feeling of wonder that it
was never thought of, or rather done, before.
Prominent among such matters is the application of
Wood for Paving in the place of stone; however much
there is yet hidden, and there is much to be learned, it
is quite clear that the fact is demonstrated that for some
localities, at any rate, Wood possesses combined advantages
not known to any other material. The drawbacks that we
know of can be guarded against, and the only reason for
alluding to the subject is the radical change involved as
to the material—as to the various methods of applying
the material no allusion is necessary, as time and experience
will solve those; as one opinion the fewer
substances mixed with the wood the better the work will
prove to be. Friction, or as we call it, "traffic," will have
its results, be the material what it may, that is required to
meet it, although that is not the only requisite in a