The Carlisle independent., 1906-11-01
IN A LEGAL SENSE.
SQUIRE RENDERS AN OPINION
 AL>IENGTH.
Hypothetical Ion Looked at from Many Por Iview and Finally
 Made elear to the Mind.

Squire Aspinwall, who had been 8 justice of the peace so long that the oldest inhabitant could not remember the date of his appointment, was a man who always deliberated well be- fore answering a question. He be- lieved in weighing his words and look ing at the matter from every stand point before expressing a positive opinion for or against. It once took him 20 minutes to answer a man who had asked him how far it was from Pumpkin Center to New Brussels. The guideboards gave the distance as four miles, but the squire was not willing 'tC say offhand that they were right, although he admitted that four miles might be said to be approximately correct. One day somebody put this question to the squire:
 eff you owned an apple tree which stood so near the line between your lot and your neighbor's that some of the limbs hung over the fence, would your neighbor have the right to pick the fruit which grew on the limbs that projected above his property
 Well" replied the squire, that's question that has to be considered in good many ways, not sayin that the legal standin' of the tree ain't clearly fixed by statoot made and provided. but as fer right and wrong there's some things to be said for and some against Supposin' it wasn't the apple tree, but horse belongin' to me that walked up to the line fence and stuck his head over. Would my neighbor hev a right to claim the horses head belonged to him? If so, an he get tired feedin' the head for nothin' he might put poison or somethin' in the grass and by killin' the head kill my part of the horse, too, whereas couldn't do nothin' to him because he could claim that he only wanted to kill his part of the horse and didn't have nothin agin my end, therefore. there would natchelly be some doubts in the mind of the jury, or, to wit, II your hen comes over into my barn and lays her eggs, do the eggs aforesaid belong to me or have you the right hereinbefore mentioned to come into my barn aforesaid and gather the said eggs to have and to hold for your heirs and assigns forever? Or we might put it still another way, viz, II you owned a COW and she broke into my meadow and her calf was born there in the meadow aforesaid, would the calf belong to me or to you? and, furthermore, if the law decided that the calf belonged to me and you came and drove your COW home, lettin' my calf starve, could I sue you for dam ages?
 "Or we might even put it another way yit, the same bein' that you plant ed a watermelon seed in your garden and the vine growed through the fence into my yard and melon growed on that end of it, and you seen that It was goin' to be mine when it got ripe and refused to hoe around the roots, and the vine therefore commenced to die, could I git out mandamus to make you keep the weeds pulled and hoe around the vine so my melon would have the nourishment it needed to grow big and git ripe? Or we might go even further and say that 1 owned a sheep and that my sheep aforesaid tried to break into your field and got stuck half way through the fence. Would you have the right to clip that part of the sheep aforesaid and sell the wool for your own profit? There fore, we can only say that there are circumstances which being unforeseen leads to hypothecations that ain't strictly in accordance with the juris- prudence laid down for the cases that might, as it were, be held in abey- ance."