THE LOGANBURN SMOKE CASE, 19 



by the chemists acting for the pursuer ; they were of the opinion 

 that any ammonia evolved would be burned owing to the high 

 temperature of the burning ironstone, and could not therefore 

 neutralise any acid. It was proved, moreover, by many 

 witnesses for the pursuer, that a distinct sulphurous smell could 

 be detected in the woods when the smoke was being blown 

 in that direction. In giving judgment in the final appeal to 

 the House of Lords by the Iron Company against the interdict, 

 the Lord Chancellor gave the following review of the evidence 

 led on behalf of the Iron Company : — 



" It was attempted by the appellants (the Shotts Iron 

 Company) to account for all the mischief by natural causes, 

 and to meet the difficulty arising from coincidence of time by 

 suggesting that the effects of those causes may have been 

 aggravated by the prevalence, at that time, of unusually wet 

 and cold seasons, and that the trees only then attained that 

 stage of their growth at which such effects would be likely to 

 be developed. I have no doubt that, to some extent, the 

 natural causes suggested by the appellants' witnesses, or some 

 of them, were really in operation in these, as they would 

 probably be in most plantations similarly situated, and planted 

 or managed on a similar system. It is also highly probable 

 that when to the ordinary operation of such natural causes 

 was superadded the deleterious influence of sulphurous vapours, 

 those trees which, from wet or bad soil, from overcrowding, 

 from want of light and air, or from any other source of disease 

 or decay, were weaker than the rest might suffer most and 

 soonest. Whatever might be the causes at work, it is perfectly 

 consistent with experience that strong plants would resist them 

 longer and better than weak, and that a noxious vapour or 

 fluid, descending more or less intermittently in a diluted state, 

 might operate upon the stronger plants only as a slow poison, 

 requiring continuance during a considerable space of time 

 before its effects would become fully manifest. This might 

 well account for much difference in the appearance of neigh- 

 bouring trees even of the same kind. 



" And the facts also relied upon by the Iron Company, that 

 some of the trees and plants which withered and died were 

 more distant from the bings than others which did not in like 

 manner suffer, is of much less weight than at first sight it 

 might seem to be, when the variations of atmospheric influences. 



