Highway commissioners are authorized to lay out public roads when required by the public; but a road may become a public highway, though never laid out by the public authorities.

Thus if land be used by the public as a highway for a long period of time, with the knowledge or consent of the owner, either express or implied, it becomes a public highway by prescription.167

But to constitute a dedication of a road as a public highway there must be not only an intent by the owner of the land to dedicate but there must also be an acceptance by the public.168

Twenty years uninterrupted use of a road by the public is sufficient to establish it as a public highway if it has been worked and repaired by the public authorities with the express or implied assent of the owner of the land through which it passes.169 And of course the obstruction of a highway which became such by prescription or dedication is as much an offense as the obstruction of one created by the public authorities.

If a road is not a public highway, then the obstruction of it is no offense.170 And one charged with obstructing a road is entitled to prove it is not a highway, by showing that the road had been changed and that the road authorities did not exercise control over it or repair it.171

166 Crouch vs. State, 39 Tex. Cr., 145. 167 Sullivan vs. State, 52 Ind., 309;

State vs. Stewart, 91 N. C, 566. 168 Hughes' Cr. Law, Sec. 1310;

Mansur vs. State, 60 Ind., 357. 169 Daniels vs. People, 21 Ill., 442;

Dimon vs. People, 17 Ill., 421.

170 Hughes' Cr. Law, Sec. 1320;

State vs. Trove, 1 Ind. App., 553; Com. vs. Nixon, 121

Mass., 42

171 Houston vs. People, 63 Ill., 186;

Martin vs. People, 23 Ill., [342.