8. Good roads tend to equalize mercantile business between different seasons of the year. Merchants having a considerable rural custom could do business more economically if the trade were dis tributed uniformly throughout the Year. However, the succession of good and bad wagon roads is only one cause of the unequal dis tribution of rural patronage.
9. Good roads permit more easy intercourse between the mem bers of rural communities, and also between rural and urban popu lations. This is an important benefit, particularly in a republican form of government.
10. Good roads facilitate the consolidation of rural schools, and thereby increase their economy and efficiency. This is an impor tant matter to coming generations.
11. Good roads facilitate rural mail delivery, and thereby tend to improve the social and intellectual condition of the rural popu lation.
12. Good roads sometimes change rural into suburban property, and sometimes are a material factor in inducing tourist travel and securing vacation residents.
3. Notice that the first eight advantages mentioned above relate to the financial benefits of hard roads, and the last four to the social benefits. In the past writers upon good-road economics have given much attention to the supposed financial benefit of hard roads and little or none to the social advantage. Any considerable expendi ture for the improvement of rural highways can not be justified on financial grounds alone (see 9). Good roads are chiefly desirable for the same reason that a man buys a carriage or builds a fine house, i. e., because they are a comfort and a pleasure. Good roads are to be urged principally for the same reason that good schools are maintained, namely, because they increase the intelligence and value of the citizen to society.