The Temple.
MY DEAR DOROTHY,—I was very sorry to hear that your holiday had
commenced in such a disastrous manner; but you were quite justified in
leaving the furnished house which you had taken for a month at the end
of the first week, when you found that the drainage was in a defective
condition.
It is all very well for the landlord to threaten Gerald with
proceedings to recover his rent for the three weeks which you did _not_
stay at his house. There is an implied condition in the letting of a
furnished house that it shall be reasonably fit for habitation; if it
is not fit, the tenant may leave without notice.
No one could possibly assert that a house whose drainage was out of
order was fit for habitation; so that, if your landlord is ill-advised
enough to bring an action against you, you need have no fear of the
result. But I fancy that he is only trying it on, and will abandon his
claim when he finds that you are determined to resist it.
It was fortunate for him that you did not stay on in his house and
contract typhoid fever, or something of the kind. If one of you had
done so, you might have taken action against the landlord for damages
and compensation.
What I have just written only applies to the hire of a furnished house.
The law on the letting of furnished lodgings is quite different.
There is no implied warranty that the lodgings shall continue fit for
habitation during the term.
I know of a case where a friend of mine took lodgings at the seaside
for his wife and family, and while they were staying there one of the
landlady’s children became ill with scarlet fever; but, as she did
not wish to lose her lodgers, the landlady concealed the fact of her
child’s having the fever from my friend. The consequence was that my
friend’s wife and child also became stricken with the fever, and he was
put to a lot of expense for medical attendance, nursing, etc. But he
was unsuccessful in an action which he brought to recover such expenses
as damages, because the jury found that the house was healthy at the
time of the letting. And the judges of the Appeal Court laid down the
axiom that there is no implied agreement in the letting of furnished
lodgings that they shall continue fit for habitation.
If a landlady were to let out lodgings knowing that one of the inmates
of her house was suffering from an infectious disease, I have no doubt
that she would render herself liable to a claim for damages if one were
subsequently brought against her; and it may give you, my dear Dorothy,
some satisfaction to learn that she would certainly be liable to a
criminal prosecution involving a heavy fine or imprisonment.
“Trespassers will be prosecuted” is a notice which one frequently sees
in the country; but it is an empty threat. Provided you are careful to
do no damage to the grass, you may trespass as much as you please. Very
often you will find such notices stuck up in fields over which there is
a right of way. In such cases the notice simply means that you should
keep to the footpath and not trample down the grass. It has been said
that it is no offence to take mushrooms, blackberries, primroses, or
wild plants of any kind or to trespass to find them.
Of course this only applies to mushrooms which are growing wild; but it
still applies even when such mushrooms may be a source of profit to the
owner of the field, provided they are growing wild and not in a state
of cultivation.
At the same time I ought to warn you that the farmers do not regard
things in a purely legal light, and they generally manage to make
themselves exceedingly unpleasant to the people whom they find
trespassing over their lands. I am bound to say that personally I
sympathise with the farmer to a certain extent.
The law does not regard professors of palmistry with a favourable
eye; on the contrary, it is inclined to class them as “rogues and
vagabonds,” although it is true that a prosecution of two professors of
the art in Yorkshire was not upheld on appeal and the conviction was
quashed. I do not think, however, that the followers of the art have
much cause to congratulate themselves on this decision as, at any rate,
the London magistrates have a very summary method of disposing of those
who are brought before them charged with practising “certain subtle
crafts, means and devices by way of palmistry, and imposing upon Her
Majesty’s subjects.”
Your affectionate cousin,
BOB BRIEFLESS.
“I NEED SOME MUSIC.”
(SONG, INTRODUCING THEME OF CHOPIN’S NOCTURNE IN G MAJOR.)
_Words by_ NORMAN R. GALE. _Music by_ THOMAS ELY, Mus. Bac., F.R.C.O.,
London.
[Music:
I need some music for my brain
As pansies need the dew;
Sing that heart-breaking song again,
And I will play for you,
And I will play for you.
Of old a sigh betray’d your breast,
The courier of your pain,
And just one tear-drop unrepress’d,
Came, shone, and fled again, and fled again.
You lov’d me then,
And when you ask if I can play it yet,
I sit and sound the tender task I never may forget.
And if you falter at the part where long ago you sigh’d,
Remember we are heart to heart serenely satisfied.]
THE HOUSE WITH THE VERANDAH.
BY ISABELLA FYVIE MAYO, Author of “Other People’s Stairs,” “Her Object
in Life,” etc.