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79
OFFENSIVE OB INJURIOUS TRADES.
buted to enrich, and where immemorial custom has
given sanction to their continuance, unless you could
with certainty affirm of them, that they cause direct
and inevitable detriment to their neighbourhood.
Every useful purpose, as regards the health of the
City, might be fulfilled by the enactment of some
moderate restriction.
Manifestly, it is opposed to the spirit of your
Act of Parliament, that any trader or manufacturer
should possess the right of diffusing in the vicinity
of his house, to the detriment and disgust of his
neighbours, any product (whether in the form of
running fluid, or volatile dust, or vapour, or smoke,
or odour) which is either disagreeable to the senses
or may be hurtful to the health. Many of the instances
which I have enumerated fall within this
description, and yet remain unaffected by the restrictive
sections of your Act.
I would submit to the consideration of your Honourable
Court, whether in the renewal of your Act,
some comprehensive clause might not be introduced,
which should deal with these difficulties, as well as
with the nuisance of smoke—and deal with them, too,
on the same principle; a clause, which (without
enumerating all trades which have been, or possibly
may become, sources of nuisance in the City, and
without specifying too narrowly the nature of the
nuisances to be guarded against) should empower
your Commission generally, in respect of every trade
practised within the City, to require that its