evidence satisfies me that for some purposes of their (the plaintiffs') trade it is necessary at times to exclude the direct rays of the sun, and that in what is called sampling, a subdued light may be better than direct sunlight. But this is not the question. It is comparatively an easy thing to shade off a too powerful glow of sunshine, but no adequate substitute can be found for a deficient supply of daylight." And in Dent v. The Auction Mart Company (i), Wood, V.-C., replied to such an argument, "It is said, 'you have actually put up venetian blinds and damaged your own light.' The answer to that is obvious. The same thing occurred in Yates v. Jack. Every now and then when the light is too much, people pull down their blinds; but that is no reason, because they accommodate the light to their work, that they should be deprived of it at all times."

Before closing this chapter, it must be remarked that there has been some little discussion as to the meaning of the word beneficially, in the direction of Best, C. J., quoted above, that to give a right of action there must be a substantial privation of light sufficient to render the occupation of the house uncomfortable, and to prevent the plaintiff from carrying on his accustomed business on the premises as beneficially as he had formerly done. In the case so often referred to of Dent v. The Auction Mart Company, the defendant's counsel urged that the plaintiff had not ventured to say that he would lose a customer. But Wood, V.-C., said, "I may here remark that I do not read the expression, carrying on the business beneficially,' as

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(i) L. R., 2 Eq. 251; 35 Law J. Rep., N. S., Ch. 564.

Mr. Giffard read it, as depending on the question whether or not the person carrying on the business is likely to lose a customer. I think it probable that Messrs. Pilgrim, for example, by carrying on their business by gaslight all day, would not lose a single client, but they would carry it on much less beneficially to themselves, whether in discharging their duty to their client on the one hand, or in preserving their health and their faculty of transacting business on the other" (j).

(j) L. R., 2 Eq. 246; 35 Law J. Rep., N. S., Ch. 560.

CHAPTER IV.

OF THE LOSS OF THE RIGHT.

THE modes of the loss of the right to window lights correspond to the modes of its acquisition. To the acquisition by occupancy corresponds the loss by abandonment; to the acquisition by express grant, the loss by express release; to that branch of the acquisition by implied grant arising from the disposition of the owner of two tenements, the loss by the union of the two tenements. That branch of the acquisition by implied grant arising from the grant of the quasi dominant by the owner of the quasi servient tenement is thus left without a corresponding form of loss; this must be looked for in the converse case of the grant of the quasi servient by the owner of the quasi dominant tenement, in which case, as we have seen, the quasi easement is extinguished. This subject has been previously treated in connection with the controversy whether in such cases the quasi easement is or is not extinguished, and will not be again discussed in this chapter.

SECTION I.

Of the Loss of the Right by Abandonment. The right to window lights is acquired, as was said in a former chapter, by twenty years' occupancy; since

the Prescription Act this is so, both in fact and in theory, and was so in fact before that statute, though there were many exceptions to the rule. It has always been allowed that an abandonment of the enjoyment during the same period destroys the right. Independently of any question of an intention to abandon the right, a countervailing easement would at the expiration of that period accrue to the owner of the servient tenement. "When a window has been shut up for twenty years," said Lord Ellenborough, "the case stands as though it had never existed" (a).

But a cessation of the enjoyment during a much shorter period will put an end to the right, if the intention of the owner of the dominant tenement to abandon it be manifest. "There is nothing unreasonable in holding that a right which is gained by occupancy should be lost by abandonment" (b). And whether such an intention exists or not must be collected from all the circumstances of the case, in which time is only one element.

The point was elaborately considered in the case of Moore v. Rawson (c). In that case the plaintiff had an ancient house, adjoining to which there had been a building used as a weaver's shop; this shop had ancient windows. About seventeen years before the action, the then owner and occupier of the premises took down the old shop, and erected on the same site a stable, having a blank wall on the side adjoining the defendant's premises. About three years before the action, while the plaintiff's premises continued in this state, the defendant (a) Laurence v. Obee, 3 Camp. 514. (b) Liggins v. Inge, 7 Bing. 693. (c) 3 B. & C. 332; 5 D. & R. 234.

erected a building next to the blank wall; the plaintiff then opened a window in that wall in the same place where there had been formerly a window in the old wall; and the action was brought for the obstruction of this window by the defendant's building. Hullock, B., directed the jury to find for the plaintiff, but reserved liberty to the defendant to move to enter a nonsuit. The question was argued before the Court of King's Bench, the judges of which delivered their judgments seriatim in favour of the defendant.

Abbott, C. J., said, "It seems to me, that if a person entitled to ancient lights pulls down his house and erects a blank wall in the place of a wall in which there had been windows, and suffers that blank wall to remain for a considerable period of time, it lies on him at least to show, that at the time when he so erected the blank wall, and thus apparently abandoned the windows which gave light and air to the house, that was not a perpetual, but a temporary abandonment of the enjoyment; and that he intended to resume the enjoyment of these advantages within a reasonable period of time. I think the burden of showing that lies on the party who has discontinued the use of the house."

Bayley, J., said, "The right to light, air, or water, is acquired by enjoyment; and will, it seems to me, continue so long as the party either continues that enjoyment, or shows an intention to continue it. I think that, according to the doctrine of modern times, we must consider the enjoyment as giving the right; and it is a wholesome qualification of the rule to say, that the ceasing to enjoy destroys the right, unless at the time when the party discontinues the enjoyment he