316 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



this is the location of a highway. The public have an easement 

 over this land ; they place a servitude of public travel upon this 

 land over which the roads are located ; but whenever these roads 

 shall be abandoned, the fee of the soil, and the soil itself, reverts 

 to the adjacent proprietor over whose land the road runs. 



Here, then, is an important principle. If the public have only 

 the right to travel over this road, you own that land out of which 

 that road has been carved, except for purposes of public travel, so 

 that if any grass grows thereon, you may enter and harvest the 

 same, without any obstructions to the public travel. If there is 

 any gravel or stone there which the highway surveyor does not 

 need for the repair of the higlnvay, you may go upon it and take 

 therefrom these materials, without being a trespasser, from the 

 familiar principle that you cannot be a trespasser upon yourself. 

 Then you have the right (unless the town supersede you, which 

 they may do, to a certain extent, under the statute,) to plant 

 trees upon the land ; you have the right to smooth down the side 

 opposite your farm to make it more beautiful, and even to culti- 

 vate crops, if you do not injure anybody. If anybody sliould 

 enter upon the side of the road adjacent to your fence, and take 

 therefrom grass, or trees, or stone, or gravel, he would be just as 

 liable to an action of trespass quare clausum /regit — in other words, 

 for trespass, for breaking into your close — as if he entered your 

 enclosure. 



I make this statement because the matter was suggested to me 

 by Mr. Goodale, and for this other reason also : that if tlic people of 

 the country are only made awai-e that tliey own the fee in the soil 

 where the roads exist, they might ieel more interest in planting 

 trees, and the highways be made more attractive to the eye, and 

 really the whole country more beautiful. 



Do not understand me to say that you have the right which cer- 

 tain people claim and exercise upon the public highway, whether it 

 is adjacent to their own homes or not, to raise obstructions, like 

 piles of wood, brick or lumber, which may hinder public travel. If 

 you do that you are personally liable for every injury that arises 

 therefrom upon the public highway. The town may be liable too, 

 and if the injured parties do not think you responsible, they would 

 be likely to resort to the town, and the town would look to you 

 for indemnity. The highway surveyor has a right to remove all 

 obstructions from the road, and haul them away to a safe pla«e, 

 and if the owner does not remove them, he has the right to put up 



