Overhanging Trees. 
173 
“ The movements of silver were thus : — 
“End December 1893, 31 \d. ; index number, 52 - 2. 
“ End January 1894, 30jjk?. ; index number, 50 - 6. 
“ End February 1894, 27f<7. ; index number, 45'6. 
“ The last-named figure represents a ratio of 34 silver to 1 
gold.” 
OVERHANGING TREES. 
In the short but interesting note on “Yew Poisoning,” by Lord 
Moreton, in the last number of the Journal the following remarks 
occur : — “ In the churchyard of a neighbouring parish a yew tree 
spreads its branches over the adjacent field. The cattle have 
grazed on these till they look as if they had been trimmed with 
shears ; ” but, adds the writer, “ no harm has been done.” This 
passage leads me to think that reports of the two following cases, 
which relate to the mischief that may be done, and the nuisance 
that may be caused to a farmer by the overhanging branches of 
trees growing on his neighbour’s land, may not be uninteresting. 
The first is peculiarly a propos, dealing as it does with the over- 
hanging branches of a yew tree. I take the report from the 
Salisbury and Winchester Journal of February 24 : — 
On Friday, the 16th inst., the Hon. R. D. Yelverton (deputy -judge) and a 
jury were occupied in hearing an action brought in the Andover County 
Court by Mr. Frank Ponting, farmer, against the trustees of the Upper 
Clatford school premises, to recover ‘221., damage sustained by the death 
of a filly foal, which was alleged to have been caused through the defend- 
ants negligently and wrongfully allowing the branches of a yew tree in 
the school grounds to extend into plaintiff’s meadow, in such a way as to 
be accessible to animals, by eating of which branches the foal died on 
June 25, 1893. From the evidence of the plaintiff it appeared that his 
meadow and the school grounds were adjacent, and separating them was 
a post and rail fence, on the school side of which grew two yew trees, the 
branches of which extended over the rail into his meadow and within reach 
of his horses. On the evening of J une 24 he saw the foal in question in the 
meadow alive and well. Next morning he went away from home early, 
and on his return at 10 o’clock found that the foal was dead. He tele- 
graphed for a veterinary surgeon, who made a post-mortem examination, 
and found in the stomach a quantity of yew leaves and twigs. Within five 
or six yards from the place where the foal was lying was one of the defend- 
ants’ yew trees, the branches of which appeared to have been recently nibbled 
by an animal. In cross-examination plaintiff said that in an adjoining 
garden, occupied by a Mr. Hunt, was another yew tree, the branches of 
which overhung his meadow, and he wrote to the owner to that effect and 
asked him to have the tree cut. In another field adjacent there had also 
been a yew tree, now cut down, but this plaintiff stated did not overhang 
the meadow where the foal was. The gate giving access to this field was 
kept fastened. On his side of the school fence was a small ditch, but he held 
that a horse could have nibbled the trees without stepping into that ditch. 
