VETERINARY JURISPRUDENCE. 
549 
the view of coming to an arrangement, but they failed. He 
scarcely knew what defence there was to the action, but he 
understood that an attempt would be made to show that the 
cows suffered from an epidemic disease, but he should prove 
that the symptoms did not at all correspond with those of 
the disease called the “mouth complaint.” The learned council 
then proceeded to call witnesses. 
Robert Peace , labourer, deposed that he was employed in 
1852, by Mr. Earle, in making the railway from Burton to 
Tutbury. The farm of the plaintiff abutted on a canal, and 
on the other side of the canal the defendant had a tank in 
which the pickling of timber for the railway was carried on. 
When the railway was finished, h'e assisted, in August, i852, 
to empty the tank, and the stuff which was pumped out ran 
through a culvert, under the canal, and into the watercourse 
running alongside the plaintiff’s grounds. 
Mr. John Lathbury y t\\z plaintiff, was next examined. He 
stated that he kept his cows tied up during the autumn of 
1852, and the following winter, and on the 28th of April he 
turned 30 cows out into some fields near the canal. There 
was a watercourse adjoining the land, which ran, after it left 
his farm, on to lands in the occupation of Mr. Hodson, Mr. 
Upton, and Mr. Page. After the watercourse left his fields 
it was joined by another stream before it got to Mr. Pagers 
lands. The cattle, when they were turned out into the 
grounds, w T ere healthy and vigorous, but five days afterwards 
they exhibited symptoms of disease. Their mouths were 
black inside, and their hocks were affected. They fell away 
in their milk. He sent for a veterinary surgeon, and believ- 
ing that the cows had been poisoned by the water, he called 
upon Mr. Earle’s manager, Mr. Harrison, who sent some 
men to clean out the watercourse. The men cleaned out the 
course the length of his fields, and also his watering place, 
but they did not clean out the culvert under the canal. Mr. 
Harrison promised him compensation, and he put the cows 
into a meadow which he had saved for mowing. He kept 
them in the meadow nearly a month, when he put them back 
into their old pasture. The cows fell off very rapidly in 
milk, and they did not recover till after they had calved. He 
w T as in the habit of selling his milk, which he sent to Birming- 
ham, for Id. a gallon, and he calculated the milk which was 
deficient at upwards of seven thousand quarts. For the first 
three months he estimated his loss by milk at £ 182 odd, and 
for the four following months at £204. He calculated that 
the cows ought to have given during May, June, and July, 
16 quarts a day each, and in the four following months, 10 
