NEGLIGENT DBIVING BY A SERVANT. 317 



employed to drive sucL a vehicle has no authority to dele- 

 gate the performance of his duty to another person, unless 

 there is a necessity for so doing. This was so held by the 

 Court of Appeal in the recent case of Gwilliam v. Twist (r). 

 There, the defendant's omnibus was being driven by his 

 servant through a public street when a policeman, thinking 

 that the driver was drunk, ordered him to discontinue driv- 

 ing, the omnibus being then only a quarter of a mile from 

 the defendant's yard. The driver and the conductor of the 

 omnibus thereupon authorised a person who happened to 

 be standing by to drive the omnibus home. That person 

 through his negligence while so driving injured the plaintiff. 

 It was held, reversing the judgment of a Divisional Court, 

 that as the defendants might have been communicated with, 

 there was no necessity for their servants to employ the 

 other person, and the employment of such person in the 

 absence of necessity, being clearly beyond the scope of their 

 duty, the defendants were not liable for the negligence of 

 the person so employed. 



If a servant driving his master's carriage, in order to Servant strik- 

 eifect some purpose of his own, wantonly strike the horse of i"o the horse 

 another person, and produce an accident, the master ivill 

 not be liable. But if in order to pet-form his master's orders 

 he strikes, but injudiciously, and in order to extricate him- 

 self from a difficulty, that will be neghgent and careless 

 conduct, for which the master tvill be liable, being an act 

 done in pursuance of the servant's employment. And 

 where a coachman, in consequence of his master's carriage 

 having become entangled with another, struck the other 

 horses, which were standing still without a driver, upon 

 which they ran away and upset the carriage, the jury 

 thought that the entangling arose originally from the fault 

 of the coachman, and that as he was acting loithin the scope 

 of his employment in endeavouring to extricate himself, the 

 master was liable (s). 



The fact that a passenger in an omnibus is struck by the Seryant strik- 

 driver's whip is prima facie evidence of negligence by the ^"S passenger. 

 driver in the course of his employment ; and even if it 

 appears that the blow was struck at the servant of another 

 omnibus, with whom there had been a dispute, and who 



authority by reason of necessity is (r) [1895] 2 Q. B. 84; 64 L. J., 



confined to certain well-known eicep- Q. B. 474; 72 L. T., N". S. 579; 



tional cases, such as those of the 43 W. E. 566. 



master of a ship or the acceptor of a (s) Per curiam in Croft y. Alison, 



bill of exchange for the honour of 4 B. & Aid. 592. 



the drawer. 



