Suit is being brought against the Hospital and myself for alleged damages resulting from the emptying of sewage from the Sawyer Colony in a small stream which flows through the land of J. S. Mull and others, and since the Hospital is not authorized to employ counsel without permission of your Excellency, I write to ask your instructions. It is important that the Hospital be defended in this matter, since in my opinion the claim for damage is practically groundless. For your information I beg to submit the following facts:-

The Hospital Commission, acting upon authority vested in them by an Act of the General Assembly of 1907, constructed a group of buildings on the Hospital premises with a capacity of about one hundred patients. The sewage from these buildings was discharged into a tributary of Hunting Creek, which flows through the Hospital land. The parties above referred to owning land one-fourth to one-half mile below this Colony made complaint a year ago asking for damages. This matter was taken up with Mr. Ludlow, Civil Engineer of the Board of Health, who advised that we distribute this sewage by a series of shallow ditches, thus allowing it to evaporate and nitrify without emptying into the creek. His suggestion was carried out promptly and since that time, to the best of my knowledge and belief, no appreciable amount of sewage has reached the creek. However, the claimants in the case were not satisfied, and in order to absolutely relieve them we are now laying a long sewer line, which diverts this sewage from the original stream to another remote from them, and which in no wise touches their land, and the suit brought is for damage done prior to this, which in my opinion is not appreciable.

Please let me know what we are to do in the way of employing counsel.