Here English law only partially agrees with what seems safe in conscience.
2. The finding of things of value without an owner confers ownership in the things found if they be taken possession of with the intention of making them one's own. Whether they ever had an owner or not is immaterial in conscience, provided that they have none at present. English law, indeed, grants property which belonged to someone who died intestate and without heirs to the Crown, under the name of bona vacantia, and when such property is claimed by the Crown, its title of course prevails. If the Crown does not claim the property, the first who should occupy it would seem to be safe in conscience if he kept it. The same doctrine may be applied to wreck found, which positive law requires to be delivered to the receiver of the district, and this officer, if no owner appear within a year, sells the same and pays the proceeds into the Exchequer. '
3. Any money, coin, gold, silver, plate, or bullion, found hidden in the earth or other private place, the owner thereof being unknown, is called treasure-trove. By English law it belongs to the Crown, but if the Crown does not claim it, the finder would be justified in keeping it.
4. One who finds property that has recently been lost may be bound in charity to take possession of it and try to discover the owner, but there is no obligation to do so in justice. If, however, he take possession of it, he is bound in justice to take reasonable care of it, and to use ordinary diligence to discover the true owner. On the true owner being discovered the finder has a right to be compensated for any expenses he has been put to in consequence of keeping the property, but he must deliver it up to the owner. As English law does not grant prescription in movables, this doctrine will hold even though the owner be discovered after the lapse of years; if the property still remains intact or in its equivalent, it belongs to the original owner and must be restored to him. The finder of lost property acquires thereby a qualified property in it which is valid against all save the true owner, and if the true owner cannot be discovered within a reasonable time, the title of the finder becomes absolute, and he may use it as his own.
5. Animals are either domestic, tamed, or wild. The property in domestic animals such as dogs, sheep, kine, pigs, always remain with the owner, however much they may stray, as long as they are not so utterly lost that there is no hope
