THE DOG AND THE LAW. 



56: 



■negligence on the part of the car dri\er at 

 the time of the accident, he will find the law 

 ever read}^ to assist him. In most cases no 

 doubt the motor owTier pays without recourse 

 to law, and in nearly all cases he is probably 

 insured against such accidents, but if he 

 refuses to pay voluntarily, and the o\\Tier 

 of the dog is reasonable and proper in his 

 demands, a necessary action at law may as 

 a rule be entered upon with every confidence 

 by the latter. 



A dog has every bit as much right to the 

 high road as a motor car. Efforts have been 

 made on the part of motor owners to get 

 the Courts to hold that dogs on a high road 

 are only under proper control if on a " lead," 

 and that if they are not on a '■ lead" the owner 

 of them is guilty of negligence in allowing 

 his dog to stroll about, and therefore is not 

 entitled to recover: such efforts have not 

 been successful. In the first place, even 

 supposing a Court to hold that the fact of a 

 dog being loose in this way or unaccompanied 

 was evidence of negligence against his 

 owner — and as far as the writer is aware no 

 Court has held any such thing — this would by 

 no means defeat his ouTier's claim, for the 

 law is, that though a plaintiff may have 

 been negligent in some such way as this, yet 

 if the defendant could, by the e.xorcise of 

 reasonable care, have avoided the accident, 

 the plaintiff can still recover. There are 

 several cases that decide this valuable 

 principle, but there is especially one which 

 is best quoted in anj- such action, viz. 

 Davies v. Mann (10 M. and W. 546). In that 

 ■case the owner of a jackass, which had been 

 negligently left hobbled and unguarded on 

 a highway, sued the defendant, by the 

 negligence of whose servant in driving along 

 the highway at too rapid a speed the jackass 

 was run over and injured. Baron Parke in his 

 judgment says, " Although, there may have 

 been negligence on the part of the plaintiff, 

 yet unless he might by the exercise of ordinary 

 care have avoided the consequence of 

 defendant's negligence he is entitled to 

 recover. Although the ass may have been 

 wrongfully on the high road, still defendant 

 was bound to go along the road at such a 

 pace as would be likely to prevent mischief. 



If this were not so a man might justify the 

 dri\ing over goods left on a public highway, 

 or even over a sleeping man, or the purposely 

 running against a carriage going on the 

 \\Tong side of the road." 



Another method by which the motor 

 owner endeavours to escape liability is by 

 contending that the accident was a sudden 

 one, so sudden that it was inevitable, that 

 nothing that he could have done would have 

 prevented it, and that he did everything that 

 it was possible to do. 



If, however, the motor is going slowly, 

 these accidents do not occur, and a motorist 

 in going along a road must have due regard 

 for all things that may occur, and must 

 always remember that he is not entitled to 

 go along at such a pace as would be likely 

 to cause accident. In a case decided a 

 short time back the motor driver proved 

 that the dog was in a ditch, and just as he 

 passed by it jumped out in front 'of him, and 

 did not give him time to pull up. The Court 

 held that that was no answer to the claim, - 

 that the diiver, knowing full well the eccen- 

 tricities of a dog, ought to have been pre- 

 pared for such a contingency taking place ; 

 instead of this he, knowing the dog was 

 there, took the risk, did not slow up at all, 

 and must pay the penalty. 



An interesting and certainly far-reaching 

 case is Millns v. Garratt, which came up 

 on appeal from the Gravesend County Court, 

 in ]\Iarch, 1906, before a Divisional Court 

 presided over by the Lord Chief Justice. 

 In this case the plaintiff and another man 

 were riding along a road on bicycles, when 

 a dog, which it was found was blind, ran 

 in front of them, and collided witli the 

 plaintiff's machine, which caused him to 

 be thrown violentty to the ground, and 

 severely injured him. It appeared that the 

 dog had been shouted at, and escaped the 

 leading bicycle, but ran into the other, and 

 it was admitted that he had run into the 

 road of his own accord entirely unaccom- 

 panied, and was blind. The County Court 

 judge held that the accident was caused by 

 the blindness of the dog, that it was dangerous 

 to traffic, and that there was no evidence of 

 precautions being taken to prevent it 



