1P4 IXJUHY TO REVERSION 



flit ]ia?. as ftir Imck as livings memory goes, and prohaMy much longer, 

 been constantly applied to two purposes— the irrigation of the meadow 

 on one side of the cut, and the watering of the cattle pasturing in the 

 meadow on the other side of the cut. These purposes cannot be con- 

 sidered temporary in their nature, although there is no certainty that 

 the meadows may not at some remote time become the sites of streets 

 and squares in a town. The defendant's counsel argued strongly 

 against the probability of such a grant, whereby the owner of the 

 servient tenement would hare deprived himself of the power of con- 

 verting it to any pui-pose inconsistent with the easement granted. But 

 it is part of the generally fictitious supposition of a grant that it 

 proceeds upon an adequate consideration." 



The latest case on the subject of irrigation is Sampson v. Hodclinott, 

 which was an action for cm injury to plahitiff's reversion lij divert in cj a 

 stream of uriter. Certain tenants of the plaintiff were possessed of 

 certain water meadows, into which meadows he claimed that a portion 

 of the water of certain streams of right ought to have run, for watering 

 the same, and Avhich defendant diverted and obstructed. A verdict 

 was taken for the plaintiflF for £200 damages, subject to a special case. 

 Judgment was given for the plaintiff in respect only of the diversion of 

 the river Yeo, and for the defendant on the alleged causes of action, 

 which related to the diversion of a stream called the Back Water, and 

 the obstruction and diversion of the Silver Lake spring. The iDlaintifi" 

 had immemorially enjoyed the benefit of irrigating certain of his 

 meadows with the water of the river Yeo, subject to the right of the 

 miller at "West Mill to detain the water for the use of his mill. The 

 natural flow of the river was prevented by the exercise of the miller's 

 right, but the water was allowed to come down at such times that the 

 jilaintiflF was enabled to in-igate his meadows effectually. The defendant 

 liad, for the purpose of irrigating his own adjacent land, from time to 

 time diverted the water after it had passed the mill, and before it 

 reached the plaintiff's meadows ; and although it did not appear that 

 the water which ultimately reached the meadows was sensibly dimi- 

 nished in quantity, yet the effect was that the water was detained by the 

 process of irrigation, and did not arrive until so late in the day that 

 the plaintiff was deprived of the power to use it fully. The water 

 was penned every night at West Mill ; and when the defendant was not 

 watering his new water-mead, the water generally came down to the 

 ].laintiff's Wyke farm about twelve at noon, and six or seven acres of 

 the plaintiff's water-meads could be watered at a time; but when the 

 defendant was watering his new water-mead the water did not come to 

 the plaintiff's farm until about three o'clock in the afternoon, and then 



