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Two Thousand Miles on an Automobile - Being a Desultory Narrative of a Trip Through New England, New York, Canada, and the West, By "Chauffeur" by Arthur Jerome Eddy
page 44 of 299 (14%)
generations to come there will be soft roads, sandy roads, rocky
roads, hilly roads, muddy roads,--and the American automobile must
be so constructed as to cover them as they are.

The manufacturer who waits for good roads everywhere should move
his factory to the village of Falling Waters, and sleep in the
Kaatskills.

Machines which give out on bad roads, simply because the roads are
bad, are faultily constructed.

Defects in roads, to which mishaps may be fairly attributed, are
only those unlooked for conditions which make trouble for all
other vehicles, such as wash-outs, pit-holes, weak culverts,
broken bridges,--in short, conditions which require repairs to
restore the road to normal condition. The normal condition may be
very bad; but whatever it is, the automobile must be constructed
so as to travel thereon, else it is not adapted to that section of
the country.

It may be discouraging to the driver for pleasure to find in rainy
weather almost bottomless muck and mud on portions of the main
travelled highway between New York and Buffalo, but that, for the
present, is normal. The manufacturer may regret the condition and
wish for better, but he cannot be heard to complain, and if the
machine, with reasonably careful driving, gives out, it is the
fault of the maker and not the roads.

It follows, therefore, that few troubles can be rightfully
attributed to defects in the road, since what are commonly called
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