"Professional Notes," vol. iv., p. 367). But it is not an uncommon thing to find that they have been permitted to do so in past times, in which case they are owners by prescription, and have as much right to any of the powers of ownership as other prescriptive owners. These cases have arisen under circumstances in which the lord's interests, or the interests of frontagers, have been badly guarded, or where the lord has conceded privileges to local authorities, on the strength of which they have afterwards presumed.

If the encroachment owners have obtained a prescriptive title by the lapse of a statutory period, they are at liberty, therefore, to remove fences, or erect railings on their own land, whether surveyors or otherwise.

On the other hand, surveyors are now bound to preserve intact the whole width of the road from fence to fence (see case quoted above, and Mr. Douglas Walker's, Q.C., recent Paper on Rights of Way."

If, however, the encroachments have not been made sufficiently long to give a prescriptive title, the matter should be "presented" at the next Manor Court, and the fence should be thrown down.

Further, if the rents paid by other owners of frontage slips are accepted as 'quit" rents due to the lord of the manor, it is immaterial whether they are paid to the steward or the agent. Such land would, I think, be held as waste of the manor, and the payer have a beneficial interest which cannot be disturbed, or could be only with difficulty, although it might be contended that in the absence of an entry on the Court Rolls the property would not be copyhold. In parts of Staffordshire and Worcestershire, in particular, there are large numbers of such waste encroachments which have been enfranchised.

If the rents are paid simply as rents "due to A,'" the occupier, whether he has held for a prescriptive period or not, should be served with a notice to quit, and put under a yearly agreement.

The resistance of enclosure by others on the part of the surveyors is not prejudiced, or to be defeated, by the fact that they accept the benefit of enclosures by their predecessors.

The facts seem to point to very serious neglect in past years, but my conclusions might be altered by further information as to the circumstances.

J. HENRY SABIN, Professional Associate.

Reply to Query CXLV. (Vol. VI., p. 31).

AGRICULTURAL HOLDINGS ACT-AGENT LANDLORD'S Valuer.

(A.)

There is no legal provision against an agent acting as valuer for the landlord or incoming tenant on a change of tenancy, unless there be a clause in his agency agreement prohibiting his so acting.

It is, moreover, very rarely the practice for an agent to act as such valuer, and as a rule it is better that he should keep free from the objection.

He would, of course, never be appointed as the umpire in such And, generally, the incoming tenant may prefer some one else. F. PUNCHARD, Fellow.

cases.

(B.)

1. Probably not. Re Elliot and The South Devon Railway Company, 2 De G. and Sm. 17.

2. No. See same case.

3. No. See same case.

(c.)

S. B. L. DRUCE, Associate.

(1) The agent of an estate is not fettered by any legal disability from acting as tenant-right valuer on behalf of his employer or his incoming tenant. Although the practice is extending, I do not think it a prudent course, nor one that should be encouraged; he should maintain the more dignified position of explaining and construing any obscure clauses not clearly understood by the arbitrators. On other estates an agent may undertake valuations either for an outgoing tenant-here he can act in a perfectly legitimate and often in a very satisfactory manner.

(2) Decidedly bad taste, he lays himself open to unpleasant remarks and even to public censure.

(3) The dictates of human nature occasionally wreck the most honest intentions. GILBERT MURRAY, Fellow.

Reply to Query CXLVI. (Vol. VI., p. 31).

RIGHT TO FRONTAGE OF NEW STREET.

(A.)

The Board have a right to erect a fence against the old wall. The owner of the wall has no right of frontage to the new street, unless (1) he can acquire the right by user, even for so short a period as four years (Jarvis v. Dean, Bingham 447) or (2) by the dedication to the public being general and unlimited as to purposes (Poole v. Huskinson, 11 Meeson and Welsby, 827).

Some weeks only having elapsed between the demolition of the building and the erection of the fence, cannot be regarded as sufficient evidence to rebut the Board's presumption of non-dedication to the public. Under Section 23 of the General Highway (Prinicipal) Act, 1835, the Board would have had to give three months' notice before two Justices of the Peace could view and certify that the road was completed, to be followed by application to Quarter Sessions for its public adoption. Although this section of the Act has not been repealed, it is constructively superseded, in places where local boards are surveyors of highways, by Sections 150-152 of the Public Health Act, 1875, which require that before a new road can be adopted, it must be made to the satisfaction of the Board, who would, doubtless, in this

case, maintain that no steps had been taken within the old statutory period of three months, to dedicate the road to the public without limitation.

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The most recent case bearing on the circumstances is Ramuz v. Southend Local Board (L. T., Ch. D., vol. lxvii., N. S., p. 169).* In that case the Board had erected a fence along an open promenade which had been used by the public for many years, and for that reason the plaintiff succeeded in getting the fence removed. As Mr. Justice Romer, in giving judgment, succintly defined the law on the subject, it may be well to give the following extract:-" The plaintiff "is entitled to succeed in this action. It is clear that his land comes "down to the very edge of the public promenade. If the fence erected by the defendants is not on the public promenade it is on the plaintiff's land, and the defendants were wrong in placing it there. "On the other hand, if the fence is on the public promenade, then, "also, the defendants were wrong, for that promenade is a public highway for foot passengers, and it is settled law that a man owning "land which runs right up to a highway is entitled to access by that "highway from his land. But, though admitting the general pro"position of law, and that the public promenade had been dedicated "to the public and was a highway, the defendants' counsel contended "that the dedication was limited in such a way as to justify the "defendants' action in putting up the fence. But I can find no "evidence of any limitation. The promenade has been for years, and "is used over every part of it by the public."

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J. H. SHERWIN, Fellow.

(B.)

I infer that the board have reserved from the street some inches or feet of land lying between the old wall and the edge of the street as laid out. Upon these inches they have erected a fence, and are entitled to do so. If the wall does not abut on the new street, the owner of the wall has no right of access to or from the street through the wall. If it does so abut, the owner, I presume, from analogy, has a right of access.

J. DOUGLAS WALKER, Q.C., Associate.

(c.)

The right of access to the street will probably be governed by the fact of whether or not the owner of the old wall was treated by the local board as a frontager to the new road, and paid any proportion of the cost of constructing the same. Lord Cockburn laid down the principle that access to the premises was the foundation for the liability." By parity of reasoning, if the owner of the wall was not charged as a frontager, he would have no right of access. Refer to Sec. 150 of the Public Health Act, 1875, and the notes thereto in Glen's edition, where numerous cases are quoted.

* See "Professional Notes," vol. v., page 496.

Do the local board own a strip of ground between the fence and the wall, outside the general line of the street? If so, the same would be in the nature of surplus land. Under Sec. 175 of the Act, the local board have power to sell it, and if the owner of the wall can acquire it, he would, by that Act, become a frontager, and so obtain the access he desires. There is no reason why the local board should give away this strip, as they practically would do, if they allowed the owner of the wall to seize it without payment as a means of reaching the street. Indeed, they may not do so, because the direction in the Act is that surplus land shall be sold for the best price that can be obtained for it.” The matter is, I should think, one for negotiation with the local board. S. B. SAUNDERS, Professional Associate.

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SECTION IV.

LAW CASES.*

(446.)

[IN THE COURT OF APPEAL.]

MEADER v. WEST COWES LOCAL BOARD.

[FEBRUARY 24TH AND JUNE 16TH, 1892.]

Public Health Act, 1875 (38 & 39 Vict. c. 55), ss. 4, 13 [Revised Ed. Statutes, vol. xvii., pp. 528, 534]-" Sewer."

M. built ten houses, laid down a large pipe drain at the back of them, and made a drain into it from each house. The large drain ran into a cesspool on M.'s land, near the houses, and was then carried on for a few yards through M.'s land till it reached the foreshore of a tidal river, and then, after passing for a short distance through the foreshore, discharged into the river. No licence to drain through the foreshore had been obtained, and it was not proved that M.'s scheme of drainage had been approved by the local board. After some time the lessee of the foreshore built upon it, and stopped the mouth of the drain, which it was admitted he was entitled to do. The overflow from the cesspool being thus stopped, the cesspool caused a serious nuisance. M. brought his action against the local board to restrain them from permitting the nuisance to continue, alleging that the structure was a "sewer," and the cesspool a "thing belonging thereto," within the meaning of the Public Health Act, 1875, and was therefore vested in the local board, and that they were bound to keep it in order :

Held, by the Court of Appeal (Lord Coleridge, L.C.J., and Lindley and Lopes, L.JJ.), that this was not a sewer within the meaning of the Act, for that the continuation through the foreshore, which M. had no right to make, must be left out of account, and then there was nothing left but a set of pipes terminating in a pit on M.'s own ground, and, as they did not carry the sewage away, they could not be considered a sewer.

Decision of Chitty, J., affirmed.-(L.R. [1892] 3 Ch., p. 18.)

* This Section is intended primarily as a clue only to Reported Cases.