After reviewing the then-leading decisions (including Bain v. Brand (1876), 1 App. Cas. 762, Holland v. Hodgson (1872), L.R. 7 C.P. 328, Hobson v. Gorringe, [1897] 1 Ch. 182, and Haggert v. Town of Brampton, [1897] S.C.J. No. 73, Meredith CJ synthesized the governing principles and articulated the following five rules respecting when property was a fixture, which he characterized as "settled law":
(1) That articles not otherwise attached to the land than by their own weight are not to be considered as part of the land, unless the circumstances are such as shew that they were intended to be part of the land.
(2) That articles affixed to the land even slightly are to be considered part of the land unless the circumstances are such as to shew that they were intended to continue chattels.
(3) That the circumstances necessary to be shewn to alter the primâ facie character of the articles are circumstances which shew the degree of annexation and object of such annexation, which are patent to all to see.
(4) That the intention of the person affixing the article to the soil is material only so far as it can be presumed from the degree and object of the annexation.
(5) That, even in the case of tenants' fixtures put in for the purposes of trade, they form part of the freehold, with the right, however, to the tenant, as between him and his landlord, to bring them back to the state of chattels again by severing them from the soil, and that they pass by a conveyance of the land as part of it, subject to this right of the tenant.