250 BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



slaughter-houses, and other establishments offensive to health and com- 

 fort, and we provide, hy compulsory assessments upon land-owners, for 

 sewerage, for sidewalks, and the like, in our cities. 



E\erywhere, for the public good, we take private property for high- 

 ways, upon just compensation, and the property of corporations is thus 

 taken, like that of individuals. 



Again, we compel adjacent owners to fence their lands, and maintain 

 their proportion of division fences of the legal height, and we elect fence- 

 viewers, with power to adjust equitably, the expenses of such fences. 

 We assess bachelors and maidens, in most States, for the construction 

 of school-houses, and the education of the children of others, and, in 

 various ways, compel each member of society to contribute to the com- 

 mon Avelfare. 



How far it may be competent, for a State legislature to provide for, 

 or assist in, the drainage of extensive and unhealtliy marshes ; or how 

 far individual owners should be compelled to contribute to a common 

 improvement of their lands ; or how far, and in what cases, one land- 

 owner should be authorized to enter upon the land of another, to secure 

 or maintain the best use of his own land — these are questions which it 

 is unnecessary for us to attempt to determine. It is well that they 

 should be suggested, because they will, at no distant day, engage much 

 attention. It is well, too, that the steps which conservative England has 

 thought it proper to take in this direction, should be understood, that we 

 may the better determine whether any, and if any, what course our 

 States may safely take, to aid the great and leading interest of our 

 country. 



The swamps and stagnant meadows along our small streams and our 

 rivers, which arc taken from the farmer, by flowage, for the benefit of 

 mills, are often, in New England, the most fertile part of the townships 

 — equal to the bottom lands of the West ; and they are right by the 

 doors of young men, who leave their homes with regret because the 

 rich land of far-off new States offers temptations, which their native soil 

 cannot present. 



It is certainly of great importance to the old States, to inquire into 

 these matters, and to set proper bounds to the use of streams for water- 

 powers. The associated Avealth and influence of manufacturers, is 

 always more powerful than the individual efforts of the land-owners. 



Reservoirs are always growing larger, and dams continually grow 

 higher and tighter. The water, by little and little, creeps insidiously on 

 to, and into, the meadows far above the obstruction, and the land-owner 

 must often elect between submission to this aggression, and a tedious 

 law-suit with a powerful adversary. The evil of obstructions to streams 

 and rivers, is by no means limited to the land visibly flowed, nor to laud 



