cut off, it is
a loss for which there is no redress, unless the well has been dug
maliciously. But where percolating water abounds and is obtained by
artesian wells a land owner has no right to sink wells on his land and
draw off the water supply of his neighbor. The right to cut ice is a
natural one, and the owner of a lake or stream may cut a reasonable
quantity, but not enough to diminish the water appreciably to the
lower proprietor.

While a person has the natural right also to the lateral support of
his land, yet he cannot use it to the injury of another. This is a
legal maxim. If, therefore, he should excavate to the edge of his
land and his neighbor's building should in consequence fall down,
would he be without redress? The rule is, the excavation must be made
in a reasonable manner. This is a question of fact in every
controversy of the kind. The owner of land adjoining a highway has no
right to the lateral support of the soil of the street. Therefore, if
the grade of a street were lowered by proper authority and one's house
located by the side of it should fall, he would have no redress
against the city or other public body.

=Quasi Contracts.=--A quasi contract is a legal obligation arising
without the assent of one from the receipt of a benefit which, if
retained, would be unjust. The law therefore compels him to make
restitution. He is required to do this, not because he has promised to
make restitution, but because he has received a benefit which he
cannot justly retain.

If one at the time of conferring a benefit on another confers it as a
gift, it cannot afterward be claimed that the gift was conferred
relying on a supposed contract. Consequently, though the donor's
intention may be subsequently altered, no obligation to make
restitution will arise. Nor does the failure of the donee to
reciprocate the donor's generosity or indirectly reward him, create
any right or claim on the donor's part to a return from the donee.

Where one, in the preservation of his own property or the promotion of
his own interests, bestows some incidental advantage to another, there
is no legal obligation to pay for the value of it. Thus the owner of
the lower part of a house is not liable for the advantage resulting to
him from the repair of the roof by the owner of the upper part and
roof. Nor is one who has thickened and strengthened that part of an
ancient party wall which is on his own land, in order to sustain the