DAMAGES, DELICT AND QUASI-DELICT. 213 



170. Damages in Delict and Quasi-delict. — The general 



rule is that a wrong-doer is liable for all the consequences that 

 may reasonably be expected under ordinary circumstances to 

 result from his misconduct, but not for remote contingencies 

 happening therefrom. The distinction between damage for 

 breach of contract and that occasioned by delict is that, in the 

 former, direct damage only can be recovered, but in the 

 latter, the highest advantage which, but for the delict, would 

 have been enjoyed.(a) The damage must be so related to 

 the injurious act that it follows it as its effect naturally and 

 in the ordinary course of events, (6) and each case must be 

 judged of by its own circumstances. Thus, a servant washed 

 a van and allowed the waste water to run down a gutter 

 towards a grating leading to a sewer, about twenty-live 

 yards off. The grating was obstructed by ice, and the water 

 flowed over the causeway and froze. A horse passing the 

 place slipped on the ice and broke its leg. This was held to 

 be a consequence too remote to be attributed to the wrongful 

 act of the servant, (c) But where a carriage belonging to A was 

 driven against the wheel of B's chaise, and the collision threw 

 a person in the chaise on to the dashing board, and the dash- 

 ing board falling on the back of the horse caused it to kick, 

 and the chaise was thereby injured ; it was held that B was 

 entitled to recover against A damasfes commensurate with 

 the whole injury. (cZ) Again, a defendant left a van and 

 ploughing gear four or five feet from the metalled part of the 

 road to stand there for the night ; the deceased drove past 

 it, and his mare, which it appeared in evidence was a confirmed 

 kicker, shied at the van, kicked, and in kicking got her leg 

 over the shaft which caused her to fall, and in fallinsf the 

 deceased received the kick which caused his death. It was 

 held by Justice Denman that the defendant's act of leaving 

 the van Avhere he did was an unreasonable use of the highway, 



(a) B. Pr. 545. 



(b) Ma}'ne on Damages, pp. 44, 45. 



(c) Sharj) V. Powell, 1872, L.R. 7 C.P. 253. 



(d) Gilhcrtson v. Richardson, 1848, 5 C.B. 502, 



