Graham v. A. Lusi, Ltd., 5 Cir., 1953, 206 F.2d 223 (Fla. law). Klingseisen v. Costanzo Transp. Co., 3 Cir., 1939, 101 F.2d 902 (Pa. law); Curtis v. A. Garcia y Cia., 3 Cir., 1957, 241 F.2d 30 (Pa. law); Mooney v. Carter, 5 Cir., 1907, 152 F. 147 (Ala. law); Quinette v. Bisso, 5 Cir., 1905, 136 F. 825 (La. law); Byrd v. Napoleon Ave. Ferry Co., E.D.La., 1954, 125 F. Supp. 573, aff'd, 5 Cir., 1955, 227 F.2d 958 (La. law); Hartford Acc. Indem. Co. v. Gulf Refining Co., 5 Cir., 1956, 230 F.2d 346 (La. law); Monongahela River Consol. Coal Coke Co. v. Schinnerer, 6 Cir., 1912, 196 F. 375 (Ark. law); Feige v. Hurley, 6 Cir., 1937, 89 F.2d 575 (Ky. law); Niepert v. Cleveland Electric Illuminating Co., 6 Cir., 1957, 241 F.2d 916 (Ohio law); Cromartie v. Stone, 1927, 194 N.C. 663, 140 S.E. 612 (N.C. law); Roswall v. Grays Harbor Stevedore Co., 1926, 138 Wn. 390, 244 P. 723, 50 A.L.R. 445 (Wash. law).
The judge who heard the evidence upon the parties' waiver of a jury trial has found that Taylor has adequate means of access for the removal of his timber by the sixty-foot right of way appurtenant to his tract and by Mill Tail Creek. A navigable stream is a public highway. Gaither v. Hospital, 235 N.C. 431, 70 S.E.2d 680; Cromartie v. Stone, 194 N.C. 663, 140 S.E. 612. Certainly, access to a navigable stream would not in every instance afford an adequate outlet for the purposes enumerated in G.S. 136-69 and thus preclude relief under it. Here, however, the judge has found that it does. He has also found that respondent's offer to petitioner of an easement to either Highway 64 or Highway 264 over its lands, other than by its private roads, provides for petitioner another adequate and proper means of ingress and egress for the removal of his timber.
And navigable waters constitute a public highway, which the public is entitled to use for the purposes of travel either for business or pleasure. Cromartie v. Stone, 194 N.C. 663, 140 S.E. 612. S. ex rel. Lyon v. Power Co., 82 S.C. 181, 63 S.E. 884, 22 L.R.A. (N.S.) 435, 129 Am. St. Rep. 8, 6, 17 Ann. Cas. 343, 56 Am. Jur. 672 — Waters, Sec. 209. However, the right of navigation gives no license to go and come through and over the riparian owner's land without "let or hindrance."
" This Court has heretofore considered a similar question in Cromartie v. Stone, 194 N.C. 663, 140 S.E. 612, where it was held that an action to recover damages for the negligent killing of one employed in rafting logs on a navigable river was properly brought in the State court according to common law principles, and that the jurisdiction was not confined to the courts of the United States. Here the deceased, ordinarily employed in other work by defendant, was assigned temporarily to the task of pumping water out of a barge lying alongside the bank of a navigable river.
At the time plaintiff was injured he was on a "public highway," since "[n]avigable waters constitute a public highway." Cromartie v. Stone, 194 N.C. 663, 668, 140 S.E. 612, 615 (1927) (holding the Cape Fear River was a public highway). State v. Glen, 52 N.C. 321, 325 (1859) (holding all rivers with sufficient depth for floatage are "public highways by water").