316 STATE BOARD OF AGRICULTURE. 



condition, unless some unavoidable accident or calamity, like a flood, happens. 

 They are liable for injuries occasioned by defective bridges — and when a bridge 

 is carried away by a sudden flood the company must rebuild it within a reason- 

 able time. The company is, however, not liable for an accident to one who 

 overloads the bridge, if it be of suflicient ordinary strength. When a toll-gate 

 keeper violated the custom of the road by shutting up the gate at an unusual 

 hour, and placed a bar not easily observable at night, whereby a traveler's 

 horse was killed, it was held that the company was liable for the value of the 

 horse. 



Though a company has a right to repair its road so as to prevent the effects 

 of rains and freshets, yet in the exercise of this right, it must take care not to 

 injure the owners of adjoining land. It has no right to turn water which 

 washes the road on to the land of a private person ; and if damage accrues to 

 the owner of adjoining land in consequence of the want of care in this respect 

 he may recover. 



The company may close its gates against a traveler liable to pay toll who 

 attempts to pass without payment ; and if such traveler forcibly saws or breaks 

 open the gate and passes through he is guilty of a malicious trespass, as well 

 as liable to a penalty, under the statute. 



In 1853, a traveler on the Howell plank road, from Detroit west, at the 

 first gate, three-fourths of a mile, tendered the gate keeper the toll for 

 one mile, and claimed a right to pass the gate. The keeper inquired how far 

 he intended to travel on the road. He refused to tell, and insisted on his 

 right to pass on payment for one mile, being all that he had then traveled. 

 Thereupon the keeper demanded toll of him to the next gate, and ordered 

 him not to pass the gate until he paid it. But the man refused to pay any 

 more, and passed the gate against the express order of the gate keeper, the 

 gate being open, and the keepef offering no personal resistance. This matter 

 having been brought before the Supreme Court, that court held that the gate- 

 keeper had a right to demand toll of this traveler at the gate in advance of 

 his actually traveling upon the road, and, on his refusing to state how far he 

 was going to travel upon the road, had a right to demand toll to the next 

 gate, and that party passing the gate thus against the order of the keeper, 

 without paying the toll demanded, was guilty of forcibly and illegally passing 

 the gate, and liable to the penalty therefor. 



The law provides that every person subject to toll who shall travel on any 

 such road between the toll gates, and shall not pass through any gate, shall 

 be liable to pay, on demand, the regular toll at the rate per mile for the dis- 

 tance actually traveled. Accordingly, when a nfan lived on a plank road one 

 mile from a store, and in going to and from the store he traveled on the road, 

 but did not pass any gate, it was held that he must pay toll for the distance 

 traveled. The statute also provides that every person who, to avoid the pay- 

 ment of toll, shall turn off from the road, or pass any gate on any ground 

 adjacent thereto and enter again on such road, shall forfeit and pay the pen- 

 alty of $10. The question in such cases is, whether one turns off in good 

 faith or with a view to avoid paying toll. When a person with a drove of 

 cattle turned off about a half mile from the gate, and traveled around some 

 six or seven miles and entered upon the road again about three and a half 

 miles from the gate, it was held to be turning off on land adjacent to the gate 

 within the meaning of the law, and having done so with intent to avoid pay- 

 ing toll, he was held liable. 



There are certain persons exempt from the payment of toll, such as persons 



