INJURY FROM OTHER CAUSES. 241 



with ordinary diligence got loose and fell into a chasm in the 

 street and was killed.^"® 



The rule as to excavations was thus stated in an English 

 case: "When an excavation is made adjoining to a public 

 way so that a person walking upon it might, by making a false 

 step or being affected with sudden giddiness or, in the case of 

 a horse or carriage way, might by the sudden starting of a 

 horse be thrown into the excavation, it is reasonable that the 

 person making the excavation should be liable for the conse- 

 quences; but when the excavation is made at some distance 

 from the way and the person falling into it would be a tres- 

 passer upon the defendant's land before he reached it, the case 

 seems to us to be dififerent. . . . We think that the proper 

 and true test of legal liability is, whether the excavation be 

 substantially adjoining the way." ^^° 



The same rule applies to defects in general. Thus, towns 

 are not bound to erect barriers to prevent animals from stray- 

 ing where the dangerous place cannot be reached without 

 straying.*^^ And they are not bound to keep the whole 

 highway free from obstructions. Thus, in Massachusetts, 

 where beyond the travelled part of the road were raised gut- 

 ters and beyond the gutters, nearly eight feet from the trav- 

 elled path, were large, loose stones which caused an injury 

 to the plaintiff's horse, it was held that the town was not lia- 

 ble. "It cannot be expected that towns shall in all cases make 

 bridges the whole width of the road or fill up ravines or cut 

 down ledges of rock. But there may be such obstructions 

 out of the travelled path as will render the road unsafe, such, 

 for instance, as would frighten horses. It is, in some meas- 



~ Tallahassee v. Fortune, 3 Fla. 19. 



And see as to an unguarded fill in a turnpike, Lebanon & P. Tump. 

 Road Co. V. Purdy (Ky.), 37 S. W. Rep. 588. 



™ Hardcastle v. South Yorkshire R. Co., 4 H. & N. 67, 74. 



That the town and a traction company may be jointly liable, see 

 Carstesen v. Stratford, 67 Conn. 430. 



^' Puiifer v. Orange, 122 Mass, 389. 

 16 



