TAXATION OF DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 57 



tent that such stock should remain in the State permanently 

 was not necessary, and that, where they were driven slowly 

 through the State with the intention of shipping them into 

 another State, such exportation did not begin, so as to exempt 

 them from taxation, until they were started on their final jour- 

 ney from the State by rail.'^^ 



The subject of a license tax on dogs is discussed in § 22, 

 infra. 



PART III. PROPERTY IN DOGS. 



20. The Dog as the Subject of a Civil Action It might be said 



with much truth that a man's two best friends, his wife and 

 his dog, were singularly disregarded by the common law. 

 The various disqualifications to which the former was sub- 

 jected do not concern us here. With reference to the most 

 intelligent and affectionate of animals, the theory of the law 

 was that property in such animals was of an inferior descrip- 

 tion and not of a kind to render the person who stole them 

 guilty of larceny. In a leading case on the subject it is said : 

 "At common law property in a dog, though recognized, has 

 always been held to be 'base,' inferior and entitled to less re- 

 gard and protection than property in other domestic animals. 

 Three reasons may be assigned for this. First, 'dogs do not 

 serve for food,' and for that reason 'the law held that they had 

 no intrinsic value,' and 'therefore,' says Blackstone (Vol. 4th, 

 236), 'though a man may have a base property therein and 

 maintain a civil action for the loss of them, yet they are not 

 of such estimation as that the crime of stealing them amounts 

 to larceny.' Although since protected by express statutes 

 from theft, the common law estimate of property in them has 

 never been changed. Second, because the dog in common 

 with the class of wild animals to which he originally belonged, 

 is subject to the most distressing and incuftble disease known, 

 which he is inclined tO' communicate and frequently, if not 

 destroyed, does communicate by his bite, to animals and 



" Kelley v. Rhoads (Wyo.), 51 Pac. Rep.^93. 



