58 DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 



mankind. For that reason any person without regard to any 

 right of property in the owner may kill a mad dog, or one that 

 is justly suspected of being mad and stand justified at com- 

 mon law. ... So, according to modern decisions, he may 

 be killed by any person, if known to have been bitten by a 

 mad dog, although the same rule would not be applied to 

 other more useful and less dangerous animals: Putnam v. 

 Payne, 13 Johns. 312. And the third reason is, that the dog 

 is chiefly propagated, kept and used for purposes (viz., hunt- 

 ing and the protection of the family, person and property of 

 his owner), which require that he should retain in some de- 

 gree the natural ferocity and inclination to mischief which 

 characterize him." ^® 



A dog is "property" within the meaning of the constitu- 

 tional provision against taking property without due process 

 of law.^* 



And at the common law an action of trespass or trover 

 might be sustained for an injury to or the conversion of a 

 dog ; *" though it has been held that case will not lie for its un- 

 intentional, though negUgent, destruction.^^ "There be four 

 kind of dogs which the law regards, viz. : a mastifif, a hound 

 which comprehends a greyhound, a spaniel and tumbler." *^ 

 And in trover for a greyhound it need not be averred that he 

 was tame.^^ Nor in an action for an injury to a dog need it 

 be shown that he had pecuniary value.** 



The subject of actions for damages for killing or wounding 

 dogs will be treated of later.*® 



™ Woolf V. Chalker, 31 Conn. 121. And see Blair v. Forehand, 100 Mass. 

 136. See, as to property rights in dogs, in general, 40 L. R. A. 503 n., and, 

 as to dog-owners' rights and liabilities, 3 Sc. L. T. 61, 65, 81, etc. 



™ Jenkins v. Ballantyne, 8 Utah 245. 



"' Chambers v. Warkhouse, 3 Salk. 140: Wright v. Ramscot, I Saund. 

 84; Binstead v. Buck, 2 W. Bl. 1117; Graham v. Smith, 100 Ga. 434; 

 Wheatley v. Harris, 4 Sneed (Tenn.), 468. And see 40 L. R. A. 507 n. 



" Jemison v. Southwestern R. Co., 75 Ga. 444. 



" Ireland v. Higgins, Cro. Eliz. 125. "^ Ibid. 



" Parker v. Mise, 27 Ala. 480. But see U. S. v. Gideon, i Minn. 292. 



''' See §§ 43, etc., infra. 



