PUBLIC ROADS.

1335

ten days after their said meeting, and the said collector shall

leave with every taxable person in the hundreds an account of

his said road tax, within sixty days thereafter, under the penalty

of five shillings for every such omission.

Note — This section is repealed by 1795, ch. 43, as to nil the counties.

save Prince George's and Montgomery, and is not therefore in force in

Allegany.

SEC. 5. And be it enacted, That when a majority of the jus-

On applies-

tices of the peace in any one county named in this act meet in

tion appoint
commis-

session at their levy court, that then they, or a majority of them,

sioners, fee.

on application in writing, signed by two-thirds of the inhabi-

tants of any hundred or hundreds through which any roads do

or may pass, to widen and straighten any old road heretofore

laid out as a public road, shall have power and authority to ap-

point three discreet persons," freeholders in the said county,

commissioners, who shall not hold any part of the lands

through which the said road or roads may pass, nor be related

to the person or persons holding the land that may be affected

by the running of the said roads, to view, survey and plot, the

said road so applied for, and make a return thereof to the said

court at their next meeting, who, on receiving such plot or

plots, shall examine the same, and all the evidence that shall

or may be offered for or against the said road or roads, as re-

turned, and may reject or confirm the same as a public road, or

may direct the said commissioners to alter and amend the said

plot, and when so amended, may reject or confirm the same,

and when confirmed, shall accordingly direct the commissioners

to mark and bound the said road or roads, not exceeding forty

feet in width, clear of ditches, and direct a supervisor or super-

visors to clear and improve the same, in the same manner, and

on the same terms, as other roads, and upon completing the

same, the said road shall be deemed a public road, and shall be

kept in repair as all other public roads in said county are by

this law directed to be kept; provided also, that notice be set

up in writing, by advertisement, at least three weeks, in the

most public places in such hundred or hundreds, by some one

inhabitant or inhabitants thereof, previous to their offering a

petition or petitions, declaring their intention to apply to the

justices of the levy court for the purposes aforesaid.

The power exercised under this section, was modified by 1801, ch. 26,

and has been since transferred to the county courts of the several counties,

by 1818, ch. 89; 1823, ch. 120; 1829, ch. 238.

By 1829, ch. 234, the levy courts of Calvcrt, Caroline, Charles and

Washington, have severally the like power with the county courts, to

alter, open, and shut up public roads.