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within the third section of the Act." In a subsequent report (No. 10,
1883), I pointed out that among the offensive businesses scheduled in
the Act of 1874 were those of bone-boiler, tallow-melter, and fatextractor,
the staple materials of which are obtained largely from rag
and bone shops. I further observed that the ' processes of manufacture
' in boiling bones, in melting tallow, and in boiling hog-tub wash,
&c., for the purposes of extracting fat, were not very obvious, and
that, in any case, the bye-laws for the regulation of those ' businesses' do
not allow collections of stinking fat, bones, etc., to be exposed so as to
pollute the air in and around the premises. Why then, I asked, should
such matters be allowed to pollute the air in the neighbourhood of the
stores where they are originally collected, and which are far more
numerous than the so-called ' manufactories ' "? The Board considered
that the nuisance " should be dealt with under the Nuisances Removal
Act, which was intended to apply to such cases," as no doubt it was.
But this Act was also intended to apply to the cases of the ' offensive
businesses,' regulated, at that time, under the Slaughter-houses Act,
subsequently repealed, its provisions having been re-enacted in the
Public Health (London) Act, 1891, the County Council, as the
successors to the Metropolitan Board of Works, being the ' Local
Authority ' in respect of the offensive businesses. In practice, however,
it had been found impracticable to deal effectually with nuisances
arising in the conduct of these businesses under the Nuisances
Removal Act, hence the passing of the special Act in 1874. The
Board, presumably, were unaware of the difficulty of dealing,
promptly and decisively, with recurring trade nuisances under the
Nuisances Removal Act, but no public body knew better the facility of
nuisance-prevention, in the case of ' offensive businesses; for under
the operation of bye-laws, providing appropriate penalties for offences
thereunder, it was manifest, as I observed, that " in properly con.
structed premises, in chambers without openings to the external atmosphere,
and in covered impermeable receptacles, bones, fat, &c.,
can be stored without nuisance." Subsequently, and when I
supposed that the question of principle had been decided
adversely to my views, by the expression of the Board's opinion, with
which the Law and Parliamentary Committee expressed their concurrence,
it came to my knowledge that the question had already been
before, and had been decided in, the High Court, in an appeal case,
Passey (Appellant) r. Oxford Local Board (Respondents). The
Appellant had been charged with having established anew, within the
City of Oxford, the noxious and offensive business of a rag and bone
merchant contrary to Section 112 of the Public Health Act, 1875.
Upon the hearing, at a Petty Sessions at Oxford, it was found (1) that
the Appellant had newly established the said busineo without the
consent of the Board ; (2) that the said business was, as a matter of