From a letter to the Editor of The Western Times, Saturday 19th January 1833:
"It will probably be, Mr. Editor, within your recollection, that I have already, on a former occasion, called your attention to the existence of a nuisance,....I allude to the fact of a great number of pigs belonging to the London Inn, being kept immediately adjoining the foot-path in Longbrooke-street, contrary to an act in existence, as also to the general practice of the judicial body, when the poor man (from an endevour to add to his scanty maintenance) chances to become the offender, by keeping a pig, not in the public thoroughfare....but perhaps in some unfrequented part of the city yet not so entirely obscure as to evade the vigilance of their officials, as the police reports weekly demonstrate; yet those very individuals, with a singular discrimination, (or owing to some strange defect of vision, arising most probably from that prevalent disease which we of the faculty term 'aurum foliaceum, ' cannot discover nuisances so palpably evident.
"Really, Mr. Editor, this is too bad, that the stern measure of Justice should be meted out to the poor man, and not to the rich; again let me reiterate the good old motto, "Fiat Justitia ruat coelum."
"Mr. Editor, yours truly,
"A SURGEON.
"P.S. The stench arising from the weekly removal of the manure on which they herd, is so revolting to the senses, that I have learnt...from the inhabitants of Hill's Court, that during these periods they are necessitated to take a considerable circuit in going to and from their houses in order to avoid an effluvia than which, for impurity, nothing can possibly exceed."
I suppose the modern equivalent might be the waste-bins which are herding around every corner of the city. The poor man is obliged by Exeter City Council to hide his bins except on the day when they are to be collected but the rich man, for which read the fast-food outlet, leaves his bins lying about the streets of Exeter. The poor man is obliged to not overfill his bins whereas the 'commercial' waste-bins gape and spew rubbish from Fridays to Mondays and no official sanctions this. I don't know that any aurum is involved but I shouldn't be at all surprised. True, the measure of Justice isn't as stern as it used to be, indeed all too few of the many wise, city bye-laws seem to be enforced.
I think I would prefer pigs to burger bags or plastic (or biodegradeable) coffee-cups. The pig just happens to be my all-favourite animal.
Let Justice be done though the heavens fall!
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