Reed v. Cheney

Reed brought suit against Cheney in the *388eourt below, alleging that the latter, by means of certain excavations, caused the surface water from lands adjoining to flow over and upon the plaintiff ’s lands, thereby injuring and destroying his growing crops, grass, etc.

The substance of the defendant’s answers was that the plaintiff’s land lay on the south, and lower side of a public highway running east and west, and that the defendant owned a body of land lying west of that owned by the plaintiff.

It was averred that the natural course of the surface water from the upper land had been from time…