The national government builds the main highways, while the cross roads are built by the parishes.  The management is in the hands of a bureau in the national department of public works, and the maintenance falls upon the people who live in the neighborhood, under the supervision of a local inspector.  Every farmer has a piece of road to take care of, according to the amount of land he owns, and at intervals slabs of cast iron are erected bearing his name and the section of the road he is to keep in order.  Thus every man’s reputation is at stake in the neighborhood, and if there is a muddy place or a rut, everybody knows who is to blame for it, and it can not be laid to the county commissioner, as is the case in America.  On the outside of each road is a line of large blocks of stone set upright, which serves as a barrier to prevent wagons from going off into the ditch.  There are 6,500 miles of main highway, and 11,000 miles of cross-road, or a total of 17,500 miles of roads in Norway, and the total expenditure upon them by national and local authorities will average a million and a half dollars every year.

The first cost of a road is usually about $3,000 a mile.  They first dig an excavation about three feet deep, as if they were going to make a canal.  On the bottom are thrown heavy blocks of stone through which the water can filter, and occasionally there is a little drain to carry it off.  Upon this is a layer of smaller stones, and then still smaller, until the surfacing is reached, which is macadam of pounded slate, mixed with gravel and stone.

During the winter the farmers have to keep their several sections free from snow, but to do this it is necessary for them to co-operate, for it would be impossible for one family to handle the heavy plows that are necessary.  Six, eight, and ten horses are often hitched to them—­all the horses in the neighborhood—­and it is often the work of weeks instead of days to get the roads opened up for travel, but when it is once done, it is as clear and smooth for sleighs as a city boulevard.

Norway has only one mile of railway for every one hundred square miles of land; but the mountainous character of the country, the heavy snowfall during the long winters, and the thin, scattered population make railway construction almost prohibitive.  Nevertheless, the new kingdom has made a commendable beginning, and the state has plans for enormous extensions during the next twenty-five years.  There are now nine railway lines in the country, with a total mileage of one thousand five hundred and eighty-four, but half of which is broad gauge.  The state railways have been constructed partly by subscriptions taken in the districts interested in the construction of new lines, and partly at the expense of the national government.