to the general statement that the ownership of the tree follows that of the hedge in which it stands.

Presuming the boundaries of an estate be known, it is a nuisance if a man allows the boughs of his trees to grow so that they overhang his neighbours' land, and the aggrieved party can take the law into his own hands and lop the overhanging boughs without giving the owner of the tree notice.

In the case of Lemmon v. Webb,* decided in 1894, which was carried to the Court of Appeal, the Judge, in giving his decision, said: “The owner of a tree has no right to prevent a person lawfully in possession of land, into or over which its roots or branches have grown, from cutting away so much of them as are into or over his land, and the owner is not entitled to notice unless his land is entered in order to effect such cutting."

The aggrieved party must not anticipate the nuisance by cutting the branches before they actually overgrow, and he must take care not to cut more than has really passed beyond the boundary.

The right to lop does not give any right to the wood or fruit of branches, and in abating such nuisance the cuttings should not be retained.

Sometimes, in the case of trees growing near the boundaries of two properties with their roots extending into the soil of each, the question of the right to lop off branches is complicated by disputes as to the ownership of the tree.

I have not been able to find a recent decision on this point, and the early ones are rather conflicting, but the latest opinion appears to be that the ownership is in that proprietor in whose land they have been first planted or sown, if that can be ascertained; but if not, the property must be determined by proof of acts of ownership.

The responsibility of a landowner who has poisonous trees, such as yew, growing on the outskirts of his estate, should be noticed. He must not allow the branches to spread beyond his boundary; if he does, and his neighbour's cattle eat of the poisonous foliage, he is liable for any damage the owner of the cattle may suffer (Crowhurst v. Amersham Burial Board, 4 Ex. D. 5), but if to get at the yew the stock had to commit a trespass by getting into the ditch or putting their heads over the hedge, in that case the owner of the yew would not be liable, and the owner of the cattle might have to defend an action for damage done to the trees.

By the General Highway Act of 1835, no tree may now be planted within 15 feet of the centre of the highway, and, if so planted, the surveyor can order its removal. If the surveyor thinks any existing trees (with a few exceptions) are prejudicial to any highway by overhanging or excluding the sun and wind from same he can, on obtaining a magistrate's order, require the owner of the trees to prune and lop them, and if the owner

* Professional Notes," vol. vi., pp. 503 and 518, and vol. vii., p. 201.

fails to comply with the order he can do it himelf at the expense of thes owner of the trees.

The surveyor cannot compel the owner to fell any tree growing in a hedgerow, except when an order has been obtained to widen or enlarge the road, and then you are only bound to cut down oak in April, May, and June, and ash, elm, or other trees in December, January, February, and March.

The magistrate's order with reference to overhanging trees must state distinctly what is required to be done (Jenney v. Brook, 6-9 B., 323), and they have not power to order the trees to be "topped," but only "lopped and pruned." Should the surveyor "top" the trees he is liable for damages (Unwin v. Hanson, T. L. R., v. 7, p. 488.) *

"Professional Notes," vol. v., p. 67.

T

Statistics.

CORN PRICES.

RETURN OF THE QUANTITIES SOLD AND AVERAGE PRICES OF BRITISH CORN, IMPERIAL MEASURE, AS RECEIVED FROM THE INSPECTORS AND OFFICERS OF EXCISE DURING THE UNDERMENTIONED PERIODS.

PROFESSIONAL NOTES.

SECTION I.

SHORT PAPERS.

The Practice of Wyrogeology.

Continued from page 229.

In 1886 Mr. F. H. Norman, having purchased the estate of Moor Place, Much Hadham, Herts, approved specifications for a deep well and 3-throw pumps, all of which were executed by Mr. Geo. Ingold, of Bishop Stortford. The well was sunk 117 feet, 62 feet being through boulder clay, largely composed of lias materials (from which Mr. Norman obtained a museum of lias and one or two new red and rhaetic fossils) and underlying drift gravel; the rest was upper chalk. The shaft is 4 feet 6 inches in the clear, with 9-inch brick-work in cement for 71 feet, and continued 4 feet diameter to the depth of 96 feet, when it was gradually enlarged from 4 to 5 feet at 101 feet from the surface. The water level came out, as predicted in the report, exactly 961 feet from the surface.

Belmont Brewery lies on the top of the hill at Swindon, and in the line of the synclinal falling from W. to E. to which the hill owes its preservation. From the base of the Portland sand at, the axis of the synclinal, on February 18, 1885, a spring in the park east of the town was flowing 5 g. p. m. On the same day it was

U

37 feet to the water in the brewery well, which was sunk 46 feet through the Portland sand into a bed of blue clay (which could not be seen for the water), which I estimated at its outcrop to be 20 feet thick, and afterwards proved it to be so in the well. Below this clay comes a bed of rocksand, which weathers into bouldershaped masses at its outcrop, and throws out weak springs (notably Westlecot spring, which was flowing 53 g. p. m.) at its base.

This bed was estimated at 10 to 15 feet thick in one or two places along its outcrop, and afterwards proved 15 feet thick in the well. The base of this bed I took as the top of the Kimmeridge clay, which is probably not less than 300 feet thick at Swindon, and recommended a boring from the bottom of the well to the top of the Kimmeridge clay. In July, 1895, this boring was carried out, but to a considerably greater depth than that indicated in the report, the accuracy of which it confirmed in every particular, and yielded a sufficient further supply to have made the boring worth making.

In the winter of 1878-9, and the summer and autumn of 1883, I surveyed and mapped the 45 square miles of chalk between the Arun and the Adur, in which the subterranean water system divides itself into three basins one draining west towards the Arun and coast, another east towards the Adur and coast, and a third (the Finden basin) towards the south coast. The autumn water reaches 300 feet on the boundary water-ridge under Sullington Down and Chanctonbury. In the trough of the Michelgrove basin it falls short of 20 feet + O. D. at 5 miles inland; at Lychpole, on the Adur side, 3 miles from the coast, it was only about 6 feet + O. D.; and in the intermediate Finden basin it falls short of 100 feet + O. D. at 6 miles inland.

The area of the Finden basin above the point at