206 INJURIES TO ANIMALS ON HIGHWAYS. 



frightened were hitched outside of the highway upon the 

 owner's premises and broke loose and ran along the highway 

 to the bridge.*^ 



In New York it was decided in Ring v. Cohoes*^ that, 

 though a municipal corporation is not bound to keep a street 

 in such a condition that damage may not be caused tO' run- 

 away horses, yet where the injury would not have been sus- 

 tained but for a defect in the highway and the driver has not 

 been at fault, the fact that the horse was at the time beyond 

 control is no defence. The rule in Massachusetts, Maine, 

 and Wisconsin is expressly dissented from and that in Ver- 

 mont, New Hampshire and Connecticut followed. In an- 

 other case it was held that a barricade built while a bridge 

 was being repaired need not serve as a barrier against a run- 

 away horse.*" And where a road thirty feet wide was in good 

 condition and had a sidewalk ten feet wide, beyond which was 

 an unfenced bank twelve feet deep and no accident had hap- 

 pened in twelve years and the plaintiff's horse, frightened by 

 a bicycle, went over the bank, injuring the plaintifif, it was 

 held that the failure to build a railing was not negligence. 

 "This was one of that class of accidents whose occurrence is 

 so rare, unexpected and unforeseen, that to hold the city re- 

 sponsible for a failure to guard against it, is to hold it to a 

 most extensive hability and to cause it to become substantially 

 an insurer against any accident which human care, skill or 

 foresight could prevent." ** 



The decision in Ring v. Cohoes, supra, has been followed 

 in the later cases.*^ 



" Ward V. North Haven, 43 Conn. 148. *" tj N. Y. 83. 



" Lane v. Wheeler, 35 Hun (N. Y.) 606. And see Stacy v. Phelps, 47 

 id. 54, where it is said: "The warning required to protect the traveller 

 was not necessarily such as would stop a runaway team of horses and 

 save them from injury." 



■" Hubbell V. Yonkers, 104 N. Y. 434. 



" See Ivory v. Deer Park, 116 N. Y. 476; Wood v. Gilboa, 76 Hun (N. 

 Y.) 175; Roblee v. Indian Lake, 11 N. Y. App. Div. 435. 



That a defect in the harness of which the plaintiff was ignorant is no 

 defence, see Putnam v. N. Y. Cent. & H. R. R. Co., 47 Hun (N. Y.) 439. 



