88 ESSENTIALS OF VETERINARY LAW 
There is a well understood principle in the law 
of negligence, that if the patient, or party com- 
plaining, has failed to follow the directions given, 
or by his own wilful or negligent act, causes, or 
contributes to, the condition complained of, his 
action is barred.*® 
The cases of Morrison v. Altig, and Conner v. 
Winton, above cited, both involve the subject of 
bailment. (Chapter X.) Where a stock owner, 
knowing that the man to whom he entrusts the 
care of his animals is not competent, unless the 
man thus employed, or thus assisting, be grossly 
careless, when harm results the responsibility 
must be placed upon the shoulders of the owner 
thus making a choice involving the risk. This 
subject is thus discussed by Mr. Justice Story in 
his Commentary on ‘‘Bailments’’: 4° 
“‘But even where the particular business re- 
quires skill, if the bailee is known not to possess it, 
or he does not exercise the particular art or em- 
ployment to which it belongs, and he makes no 
pretension to skill in it; then, if the bailor, with 
full notice trusts him with the undertaking, the 
bailee is bound only for a reasonable exercise of 
the skill which he professes, or of the judgment 
which he can employ; and if any loss ensue from 
want of due skill, he is not chargeable. Thus (to 
put a case borrowed from the Mohammedan law), 
if a person will knowingly employ a common mat 
maker to weave or embroider a fine carpet, he may 
48 Jones v. Angell, 85 Ind. Hitchcock v. Burgett, 38 Mich. 
376; Lower v. Franks, 115 Ind. 501; Littlejohn v. Arbogast, 95 
334, 17 N. E. 630; Hibbard v. Ill. App. 505. 
Thompson, 109 Mass. 286; 49 453, 
