574 REASONABLE TRIAL OF HORSE. 



incumbent on the purchaser to return the horse as soon as the faults 

 were discovered, unless the seller by any subsequent misrepresentation 

 induced the purchaser to prolong the trial. A trial means a reasonable 

 trial : but here nearly seven months had elapsed after the horse was 

 known to be restive, and before the return, and therefore the verdict 

 for the defendant was right. Forty years after it was urged on the 

 argument in Patteshall v. Tranter, where the horse was discovered to 

 be paralyzed in the spine shortly after the sale, and the plaintiff gave 

 no notice for nine months, but put him into physic and cut his tail, 

 that Fielder v. Starkin had been overruled, or at least qualified by other 

 decisions in the interim ; but Lord Demnan C.J. said, with the assent 

 of Littledale, Patteson, and Coleridge J.J. : "We think that Fielder v. 

 Starkin is not overruled." And the nonsuit was set aside and a new 

 trial ordered. 



When a certain time for trial is fixed upon, the person granting it cannot 

 break off the negotiation till it is concluded. And so in Ellis v. Mortimer, 

 where the defendant told the plaintiff, when only a fortnight out of the 

 month was expired, that he liked the horse but not the price, and was 

 requested to send the horse home, but did not do so till three or four 

 days before the close of the month, the plaintiff could not maintain an 

 action against him for the price. 



A lorrowed horse camiot he used hy a servant {Bringloe v. Morrice), 

 which was the case of a master and servant riding by turns to York. 

 But a man may jnd his servant on a hired horse (ib.) ; and if he is about 

 to buy a horse he is not limited to trying its paces himself, but has a 

 right to put his groom or a competent horseman on it for the purpose 

 oi^a trial, and provided they do nothing more than is necessary, even 

 if the horse runs away and injures itself or is killed, he is not liable 

 (Camogs (Lord) v. Scurr). If a person rides a horse gratuitously for 

 another at the ownei-"s request, in order to show him for sale, he is bound 

 to use such skill and care as a person conversant with horses might be 

 reasonably expected to use, and if he does not, he is equally liable with 

 a borrower for injury done to the horse while ridden by him. Hence 

 in Wilson v. Brett, where the defendant, a skilled horseman, took a horse 

 for inspection into a cricket-field, where it slipped several times oiving to 

 the nature of the field, and broke its knees, the Court of Exchequer re- 

 fused to set aside a verdict for the plaintiff, and considered that the 

 proper question for the jury was that put by Eolfe B., whether the de- 

 fendant did or did not use such skill and management in choosing his 

 ground and handling his horse as he really possessed. And per^ Eolfe 

 B. : " The distinction between this case and that of a borrower is that 

 a gratuitous bailee is onlg bound to exercise such skill as he possesses, 



