1874-Annual Report - Laserfiche WebLink

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14 the Railroad, we should have not only to divert the water from its natural channel, and leave a large portion of the meadows undrained; but we should violate the express pro- visions of the law, which confines' us to the channels, or such cross ditches in said meadows, or the low and swampy lands connected therewith. To drain the upper meadows down on the westerly side of the Railroad, would be to abandon the meadows, and the low and swampy land, and to cut, not a side or cross drain, but our main drain through at least twelve or fifteen hundred feet of dry upland, with a cut of from nine to twelve feet. The Railroad is here located five rods wide, and is for a considerable distance entirely upon upland, and we should be- required to keep west of their location where the land is still higher, as they informed us that they could not allow us to occupy their ground, because with a ditch two or three feet lower than theirs, in that loose and peculiar soil, we should undermine their road, and cause them great trouble. Moreover, we should have no legal right to cut through that section of upland ; and as one of the owners of that portion of land, is opposed to the whole system of drainage, he would rightfully have ejected us from his premises. Be- sides; as the cut would be deep, and the sol is very loose, the ditch must have been curbed or walled up, on both sides, or a very wide strip of land.taken for the ditch, and in either case, it would probably have cost more than it has to'cross the Railroad with culverts, since the corporation have agreed to pay five hundred dollars towards the expense. It might seem unnecessary to • labor a point so clear; but as some persons who evidently have never examined the sub- Sect, and are to this day ignorant of the facts in the case, have charged us with spending money unnecessarily, we have deemed it due to the public to state the facts in the case. Equally unfounded, is the statement which has been made by some, that the Railroad Company had furnished a suffi- cient system of drainage. Before the upper culvert was opened in their road, their diversion. of the stream from its