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 know as road-building. Many routes were cleared of "standing and lying trees" and "stumps and shrubs" were cut "close by the ground"—but this only widened the path of the Indian and was only a faint beginning in road-building. The skiff, batteau, and horse attached to a sleigh or sled in winter, were the only common means of conveying freight or passengers in the colonies at this period. We have spoken of the path across the Alleghenies in 1750 as being but a winding trace; save for the roughness of the territory traversed it was a fair road for its day, seek where the traveler might. In this case, as in so many others, the history of the postal service in the United States affords us most accurate and reliable information concerning our economic development. In the year mentioned, 1750, the mail between New York and Philadelphia was carried only once a week in summer and twice a month in winter. Forty years later there were only eighteen hundred odd miles of post roads in the whole United States. At that time (1790) only five mails a week passed between New York and Philadelphia.