is given within six weeks from the date of the accident under sects. 4 and 7.

All actions under the Act must, under sect. 6, be commenced in a County Court, though it may be removed for trial to the High Court (g), when good reasons can be shown for removal.

The Workmen's Compensation Acts of 1897 and 1900 render an employer an insurer of his workmen against the loss caused by injuries which may happen to them whilst engaged in his work irrespective of the cause of such injuries. These Acts, which do not repeal the Employers' Liability Act or affect the previously existing rights of workmen founded either upon common law or statute, are not of general application, but apply only to certain specified employments (7).

In case of any proceedings claiming damages for negligence against any public authority, it is necessary to comply with the requirements of the Public Authorities' Protection Act, 1893. Public authorities may make tender of amends in such cases, and, if sufficient, then can claim costs as between solicitor and client (i).

The action must be commenced within six months after the act, neglect, or default complained of, or in case of a continuance of injury or damage within six months from the ceasing thereof (sect. 1 a.). Therefore, in the case of an action under Lord Campbell's Act, the period runs from the date of the neglect, or, in the case of a continuance of the injury or damage to the deceased person, from the ceasing of such injury or damage; the words, injury or damage, mean the injury and damage which causes the death, and not the injury and damage suffered by the person claiming damages in respect of the death (k).

(g) I.e., by certiorari.

(h) See p. 157.

See Chapter IV. (end of), and 56 & 57 Vict. c. 61, in the Appendix. (k) Markey v. Tolworth Joint Hospital, &c., (1900) 2 Q. B. 454; 69 L. J. Q. B. 738; 83 L. T. 28.

CHAPTER IV.

NUISANCE AND EXCESSIVE TRAFFIC.

PASSING from the liability of individuals for negligence, their liability for nuisance and obstruction should be next considered. A nuisance may be a public or a private nuisance, and the remedies vary. The remedy for a public nuisance is by indictment, or by an individual by information after obtaining the "fiat" of the Attorney-General. In the case of a public nuisance no private individual can maintain an action unless he can show that the nuisance complained of has caused him in particular special and direct damage beyond that sustained by the general public.

It will be remembered that by the Locomotives on Highways Act, 1896, certain enactments relating to locomotives are repealed so far as regards motor cars; but sect. 13 of the Locomotives Act, 1861 (a), is excepted and is not repealed, and it therefore applies to the use of all motor cars. That section runs as follows:-"Nothing in this. Act contained shall authorize any person to use upon a highway a locomotive engine which shall be so constructed or used as to cause a public or private nuisance; and every such person so using such engine shall, notwithstanding this Act, be liable to an indictment or action, as the case may be, for such use, where, but for the passing of this Act, such indictment or action could be maintained." The result of this section is that locomotives of all kinds, when used upon highways, are subject to the ordinary law as to nuisances, as are all other kinds of vehicles.

A nuisance may, as already stated, be public, in which case it only affects the rights of the public as such; or it may be private, in which case it is only the individual who is affected; or it may partake of the characteristics of both, insomuch as, while being a public nuisance, it also inflicts a special and direct injury upon the individual who complains.

B.

(a) 24 & 25 Vict. c. 70.

M

In the present work it is not proposed to go further into the question of public nuisances than to say, as already has been stated, that the remedy is either by indictment, or by information after the "fiat" of the Attorney-General has been obtained, or thirdly, by action at the suit of the AttorneyGeneral. The law and procedure is very fully explained in the text-book, to which the practitioner is referred (b).

It may be useful, however, to give a few illustrations of nuisances which have been held to give an individual a right of action as having suffered a special and direct injury; and it should be here mentioned that cases of "obstruction are to be found in text-books and in decided cases, both under the head of negligence and under the head of nuisance. Vehicles of all kinds may be nuisances, and vehicles of all kinds may, when causing such a nuisance, cause damage to an individual, either by reason of the act complained of amounting to a nuisance, or by reason of the act complained of amounting to an obstruction. Under certain general Highway and Police Acts, as already pointed out, the owners of vehicles of all kinds, or, under the Locomotives Acts, owners of locomotives, are liable to penalties upon summary conviction (c). At present the subject to be dealt with is the question of the liability of the owners of vehicles, causing a nuisance or obstruction, to the individual or corporate body complaining, at common law in civil actions.

The use of such vehicles as locomotives, which, apart from statutory authority, would be nuisances, is limited; and the limit is, as Lord Justice Lindley says, that which is set by the general law of the country, that they do not commit a nuisance (d).

Under sect. 28 of the Towns Police Clauses Act, 1847 (10 & 11 Vict. c. 89), and under sects. 54 and 60 of the Metropolitan Police Act, 1839, it is an offence (inter alia) to ride or drive furiously, or to cause an obstruction in any street, or to throw or lay down any stones, slate, timber, iron, or other materials in any street; this would include the throwing or laying down of broken glass or china or nails,

(6) Garrett on the Law of Nuisances.

See ante, sect. 1 (1) (b), note. Or on indictment for nuisance: see R. v. Russell, 6 East, 427; R. v. Cross, 3 Camp. 224; R. v. Chittenden, 15 Cox, C. C. 725; 49 J. P. 503.

(d) Rapier v. London Tramways Co., (1893) 2 Ch. 588; 63 L. J. Ch. 36. See also Jeffrey v. St. Pancras Vestry, 63 L. J. Q. B. 618. A steam roller is a nuisance, and the owners liable for damages though not guilty of negligence.

which would most probably cause damage to the tires of motor cars or cycles.

An obstruction may be only temporary in character and yet be a nuisance, owing to the obstruction being an unreasonable user of a highway in point of time or otherwise. If the act done is one which is incidental to the user of the highway, and is done in a reasonable and prompt manner, as in the case of unloading goods such as coal from carts into cellars, then this will not be a nuisance (e). If, however, the user is excessive, then the act is a nuisance; the test being whether or not the obstruction of the street or highway is greater than is reasonable in point of time and manner, taking into consideration the interests of all parties, and whether it is without unnecessary inconvenience (f). In the case just referred to, the plaintiff complained that the defendants, by continually emptying vans close to his shop, not only shut out the light to a serious extent, but also obstructed the access to the shop, while at the same time offensive smells were caused by the horses continually standing there; it was held that the plaintiff was entitled to maintain his action. In a case of doubt or difficulty the right of the occupier of premises abutting on a highway to make a reasonable use of it, for the purpose of loading and unloading goods at his premises, must yield to the public right of unobstructed passage along the highway (g).

The case of Harris v. Mobbs (h) has been already alluded to when dealing with the subject of negligence; it is only necessary to remind the reader that the leaving of the van attached to a steam plough, which frightened the mare driven by the deceased man, and so caused the action, was a negligent user of the highway, which in law amounted to a nuisance.

Where the defendants, a water company, in the course of their works negligently permitted water to spout up in the highway, and thereby frightened the plaintiff's horses which were being driven along the highway, and caused them to fall into a cutting, in consequence of which they sustained

(e) See R. v. Longton Gas Co., 2 El. & El. 651; 29 L. J. M. C. 118. Compare sect. 28 of Towns Police Clauses Act, 1847, and sect. 54 of the Metropolitan Police Act, 1839.

(f) Benjamin v. Storr, L. R. 9 C. P. 400; 43 L. J. C. P. 162.

(g) Att.-Gen. v. Brighton and Hove Co-operative Supply Association (C. A.), (1900) 1 Ch. 276.

(h) L. R. 3 Exch. 268. See also Wilkins v. Day, 12 Q. B. D. 110; 49 L. T. 399; Jeffrey v. St. Pancras Vestry, 63 L. J. Q. B. 618, see ante, p. 142.

injuries, it was held that they were liable (i). So also in a similar manner, smoke, steam, or excessive noise or speed, proceeding from a locomotive upon a highway may be such as to amount to a nuisance; and if, so being a nuisance, an injury be occasioned thereby, no doubt an action would lie at the instance of the person suffering the injury. Cases of this nature are on the border line between nuisance and negligence, and partake of some of the characteristics of each; it is the negligence in using which causes the nuisance, and it is the actual nuisance which causes the injury, and so gives rise to a cause of action at the instance of the person suffering the injury.

It is not necessary for the plaintiff to prove, in order to establish a cause of action, that the nuisance complained of was actually upon the highway, so long as he can show that it was so near thereto as to cause an appreciable danger or unreasonable user having regard to the user of the highway by other persons. It should be noticed in this connection that the Local Government Board have recognized that motor cars may possibly cause danger, by frightening horses or cattle, or in other modes, and have therefore made regulations (k) as to speed, and as to the manner in which motor cars shall pass horses or cattle, or on request stop and remain stationary.

Thus the leaving of any vehicle or object either on, or near, a highway, in such a manner as to frighten horses or cattle is an actionable nuisance (1). And evidence would be admissible to show that other horses had shied at the same object, such as a heap of rubbish near the highway (m). So also it would seem, from the judgment of Stephen, J., in this last case, that any person, erecting on his own land anything whatever calculated to interfere with the convenient user of the road, commits a nuisance; so also, if he keeps a ferocious or noisy dog, likely to frighten horses by barking. In a similar manner the keeping of dangerous materials, such as gunpowder, gas, petroleum, &c., would, in case of injury caused thereby to an individual, appear to be actionable nuisances; but it is almost impossible to lay down any definite rules for the guidance of practitioners, because, in each case as it arises, it must depend upon the particular facts

(i) Hill v. New River Co., 9 B. & S. 303.

(k) Ante, p. 27, Article IV.

(1) Harris v. Mobbs, ante; Wilkins v. Day, ante.

(m) Brown v. E. & M. Rail. Co., 22 Q. B. D. 391; 58 L. J. Q. B. 212.