Chapter the thirteenth.
Of Nusance.
A third ſpecies of real injuries to a man’s lands and tenements, is by nuſance. Nuſance, nocumentum, or annoyance, ſignifies any thing that worketh hurt, inconvenience, or damage. And nuſances are of two kinds; public or common nuſances, which affect the public, and are an annoyance to all the king’s ſubjects; for which reaſon we muſt refer them to the claſs of public wrongs, or crimes and miſdemeſnors: and private nuſances; which are the objects of our preſent conſideration, and may be defined, any thing done to the hurt or annoyance of the lands, tenements, or hereditaments of another[1]. We will therefore, firſt, mark out the ſeveral kinds of nuſances, and then their reſpective remedies.
I. In diſcuſſing the ſeveral kinds of nuſances, we will conſider, firſt, ſuch nuſances as may affect a man’s corporeal hereditaments, and then thoſe that may damage ſuch as are incorporeal.
1. First, as to corporeal inheritances. If a man builds a houſe ſo cloſe to mine that his roof overhangs my roof, and throws the water off his roof upon mine, this is a nuſance, for which an action will lie[2]. Likewiſe to erect a houſe or other building ſo near to mine, that it ſtops up my antient lights and
