276 ESSENTIALS OF VETERINARY LAW 



or that he might reasonably have known that 

 fact.i' 



229. Bailment, Sale, or Gift. It is sometimes a 

 question whether the transaction may be a bail- 

 ment, sale, or gift. The distinction is this: In a 

 bailment the ownership remains in the possession 

 of the original owner, to whom the bailee must 

 return the article bailed. The bailor may sell or 

 mortgage his property, subject to certain possible 

 liens held by the bailee. In a sale there is an 

 exchange of ownership for a compensation. In the 

 gift there is an exchange of ownership without 

 compensation. In bailment the owner cannot give 

 possession to a possible vendee until the termina- 

 tion of the bailment. If the bailment is indefinite 

 as to time it may be terminated at the will of either 

 bailor or bailee ; ^^ but if it be for a given tenn it 

 cannot be terminated before the time set, except 

 by the agreement of both bailor and bailee. Thus, 

 where sheep were let for one year the court held 

 that there was essentially a change of ownership, 

 and that the payment for the sheep received was 

 to be made in a like number of sheep of the same 

 kind one year from the date they were received.^' 



Though the distinction between bailment, sale 

 and gift seems simjole in the abstract, in practical 

 application it may not be so plain. Suppose a poor 

 man should lose his cow, and his rich neighbor 

 should tell him: ''You may take one of my cows," 



15 Copeland v. Draper, 157 it Bellows v. Denison, 9 N. 



Mass. 588, 19 L. E. A. 283. H. 293; WUson v. Finney, 13 



10 Learned Letcher Lumber Johns. 358. 

 Co. V. Fowler, 109 Ala. 169, 19 

 So. 396. 



