R.M. COURT.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume VII, Issue 2032, 3 July 1885, Page 2

R.M. COURT.

FEATHERSTON. -THURSDAY.

[BoforoH. A, Stratford, R, M., and Messrs Donald, Reynolds, and Niools J.P.'s,] ' 1

James Wilkinson v. Lot Cross-Claim £2 lis Gd. The plaintiff claimed this amount from the defendant as the costs incurred by him in repairing p, fence destroyed by fire in February 1884, such destruction being aOeged to have been caused by the negligence of the defendant in not having cleared away from the fence certain scrub which he had felled ready for burning, The sorub caught lire, as was believed, from a spark from a railway engine, and spread from defendant's land on to tho plaintiff's, and destroyed the fence. '

Mr Bunny appeared for the plaintiff, and tho dofendant conducted his own case. ,

In defence evidence was given that, a few days before the tire topic place, the felled scrub had been cleared away from the fence, and that, tho fire ran along in the grass until the scrub was reached, Mr Bunny placed before the Court oases in support of his argument that tho defendant was liable.

The Court ruled, however, that tho evidenco for the plaintiff had failed to fix on tho defendant the responsibility for the fire, and gave judgment for the amount claimed, as being tho sum for which the defendant was liablo for the repairing of the fenco, and divided the costs of the action equally between them, remarking that, although it to evident that the principle was, being contended fqr, and not the amount of money claimed, still it seemed a pity that the parties had not exeroised their good sense, and agreed to settle the matter amicably between them,

There wore several other cases, whicl were settled out of Court,