DEFINITION OF MORTALITY. 231 



CHAPTER VIII. 



CONVEYANCE OP HORSES AND CATTLE. 



Very few cases of injuries to, or losses of, horses and cattle during 

 conveyance from place to place, are to be met with in the books, before 

 the universal establishment of railways. In Lawrence v. Aherdein, two 

 mules, an ox, and five asses were killed, and the remainder received 

 such severe injury from the pitching of the ship, that nearly all of 

 them died. The Court decided that this was a loss hij jieril of the sea, 

 and that the underwriters were liable on a policy which warranted 

 them "free ofmorMity and jettison." Best J. said : " The underwriters 

 have only stipulated that they will not be liable for loss by mortality. 

 That word in its ordinary and popular sense signifies death arising 

 from natural causes, and not from violence. I think, therefore, that 

 the underwriters must be taken to have intended to exempt themselves, 

 by this exception, from that species of loss which occurredin Tatham v. 

 Hodgson, a loss of which death was the proximate cause, and the perils 

 of the sea the remote cause. Here the injury done to the animals arose 

 directly and immediately from the violence of the tempest ; or, in other 

 words, from the perils of the sea. In Tatham v. Hodgson, the want of 

 provisions was the immediate cause of the death of the slaves ; the 

 remote cause was the circumstance of the ship having been driven out 

 of her course by the perils of the sea, in consequence of which the 

 provisions, which otherwise would have been quite sufficient for the 

 voyage, were exhausted." 



The construction put by the Court on the word " mortality," in the 

 above case, governed their decision in Galjag v. Llogd, which was an 

 action of assumpsit on a policy of assurance on three horses, " war- 

 ranted 'free from jettison or mortality." It was there found, by a 

 special verdict, that in consequence of a storm, the horses broke down 

 their slings, and killed themselves by kicking down the partitions ; 

 and that at Lloyd's Coffee-house, where the policy was efiFected, a 

 particular usage prevailed with respect to policies on live stock. The 

 Court ordered the postea to be delivered to the plaintiffs, and ruled 

 that as the usage found by the verdict to prevail at Lloyd's cannot 



