MINES. Mines are properly openings in the ground from which any thing is dug. Until an opening is made, the name is not properly applied, though the term is now generally used to signify coal, lead, iron and so forth, before au opening is made for digging them out.
Mines belong to the tenant in fee-simple of the land, with the exception of gold and silver mines, which belong to the king by his prerogative, but by 1 W. & M. e. 30, a mine of copper or tin is not to be considered a royal mine, though silver be extracted from the ore. The owner of land in fee-simple is the owner of everything which lies in a perpendicular direction under the surface to any depth. A tenant for life, unless his estate is without impeachment of waste, cannot dig earth, lime, clay, or stone, except for the repair of buildings or the manuring of the land. in fact, the general principle is, that the land, which term comprehends everything in it or that is permanently attached to it, cannot be taken away by any other person than the tenant in fee-simple or a tenant in tail. Accordingly a tenant for life cannot open a new mine, but he may work nines which are already open, and he may open new shafts for working veins of coals which have been already worked. A tenant in tail has an estate
of inheritance, and incident to it the power of committing waste, as by cutting down timber or opening mines.
If a man who has an estate in fee leases the land with the mines upon it, the lessee is thereby empowered to dig for the minerals ; and if he leases lands on which mines are already open, the lessee may work them.
The freehold of all copyhold lands is vested in the lord, and it is a legal consequence that he has the freehold of the mines. In some cases a copyholder of inheritance has by the custom of the manor a right to the timber, and the lord has no right to dig mines, unless there be a custom which gives him the right.
If a man works mines under his own land, and follows the ore or other substance under his neighbour's land, he is a trespasser.
The act 7 & 8 Geo. IV. c. 30, § 6, 7, enacts certain punishments for malicious injuries done to mines. [Moucrous INJURIES.]