ROADSIDE WASTES. 291 



such a size and dimension and solidity as to obstruct and 

 prevent the passage of carriages and horses or foot passengers 

 upon the part of the highway where they stood, the jury ought 

 to find the defendants guilty upon this indictment/' * 



The jury, upon this direction of the judge, found the 

 defendants guilty of obstructing the highway. The 

 summing-up of Baron Martin was subsequently approved 

 by the Exchequer Judges. 



The right of the public has been further vindicated 

 by the advice of the Commons Society, during the last, 

 few years, in two cases, where, although there was no 

 decision in the Courts of Law, it is certain that if any 

 shred of law could have been found to sustain them, 

 the inclosers of road-side wastes would have appealed 

 to it. 



In the first of these cases the late Marquis of 

 Salisbury, in the year 1807, inclosed the roadside 

 wastes over a wide district in the neighbourhood 

 of Hatfield, where he was Lord of the Manor, and 

 claimed as such the ownership of the soil of the wastes. 

 For nearly two miles of road, where this was effected, 

 the present Earl Covvper was owner of the adjoining 

 land. He found the frontages of his land to the 

 highways cut off by narrow strips of land thus in- 

 closed. It would be difficult, therefore, to conceive 

 a more glaring and obnoxious case of inclosure of road- 

 side wastes. 



Lord Cowper having in mind the then recent action 

 of Mr. Augustus Smith, in removing the fences in the 



* Reg. v. United Kingdom Electric Telegraph Co., 3, P & F, 73. 

 T 2 



