154 INJURING AND KILLING ANIMALS. 



from which it died, the owner of the fence was held not liable. 

 The court said: "They would be a nuisance along the side- 

 walks of this city or along the sidewalks of most of the towns 

 and villages of the province, but they are not found to be so 

 in the country parts. ... I am disposed to allow of the 

 barbed-wire fence as a great improvement in fence-making in 

 all places where it can properly be used, as on country high- 

 ways and perhaps as party fences." In this case there was no 

 board or cap to render the fence visible : it consisted only of 

 wire stretched on posts.^*^ 



In an Indiana case, where cattle were permitted to run at 

 large, a land-owner negligently constructing and maintain- 

 ing a barbed-wire fence between his pasture and the adjacent 

 highway so as to be a trap to animals, was held liable for the 

 value of a horse which, while feeding on the highway, was 

 attracted by other horses within the field and by grass therein, 

 and, attempting to enter, was entangled in the wires and 

 killed;^*^ and the same rule has been applied in Alabama,^^* 

 and Missouri.^ *^ Otherwise, where the animals are running 

 at large contrary to law.^®® 



In a New Jersey case it was held that a man who led a res- 

 tive horse along a road within eight feet of a barbed-wire 

 fence and did not hold him close but gave him ten feet of 

 rope was guilty of contributory negligence and could not re- 

 cover for an injury to his horse by running against the fence. 

 The court said : "The case is not entirely free from the question 

 of contributory negligence ; if it were, it would raise the bold 

 question whether the erection and maintenance of a barbed- 

 wire fence along a public highway were negligence plain and 



"' Hillyard v. Grand Trunk Ry. Co., 8 Ont. 583. The colt, five weeks 

 old, following its dam was also held to be not "running at large." This 

 case "it is to be hoped will be followed as the leading decision on this 

 question hereafter. . . . This is an extremely well-considered case": 16 

 N. J. L. Jour. 107. 



"" Sisk V. Crump, 112 Ind. 504. "' Hurd v. Lacy, supra. 



''° Foster v. Swope, 41 Mo. App. 137; Colvin v. Sutherland, 32 id. 77. 



"" Galveston Land & Imp. Co. v. Pracker, 3 Tex. Civ. App. 261. 



