558 
The Law looks upon fighting between dogs 
as a natural and necessary incident in the 
career of every member of the canine race, 
and gives no redress to the owner of the van- 
quished animal, provided the fight was a 
fair one, and the contestants appear to 
consider it so. The owner, however, of a 
peaceably disposed dog which is attacked 
and injured, or killed, by one savage and 
unrestrained, has a right of action against 
the owner of the latter. The owner of the 
peaceably disposed animal may justifiably 
kill the savage brute in order to save his 
dog, but if he takes upon himself to do this 
he must run the risk of being able to prove 
that this course was the only means of 
putting a stop to the fight. The approved 
method of saving your dog in such a crisis 
according to a case which has been decided 
(Wright v. Rainwear, 1 Sid. 330) is to beat 
off your dog’s opponent with a stick, but, 
as is pretty well known, this, with a game 
dog, is a useless method of procedure, and 
is also an extremely foolish one; there are 
much better ways of parting two fighting 
dogs, especially when they belong to the 
smaller breeds, such as Terriers, in which 
the writer has some experience. When two 
specimens of the large sized breeds, such as 
Mastiffs or Great Danes, are exchanging 
courtesies in this way, and get a hold of 
one another there is nothing better than a 
good big pinch of snuff adroitly placed, and 
one gentleman whose kennel of Danes was 
world-famed, always made it a rule when 
out with his hounds, to carry with him a 
well-filled snuff-box of substantial size, 
which he used with invariable success on all 
such occasions. 
“Beware of @€ two notices which it is 
the Dog” not uncommon, especially in 
and “Dogs country places, to observe 
will be Shot” : : 
written or painted upon gates 
or in covers respectively. It may there- 
fore be interesting in this section to 
inquire as to the way in which the Law 
looks upon them, and what they mean. 
With regard to the former, it is more or 
less a common practice, especially in lonely 
districts and in factory yards, where at 
THE NEW BOOK OF THE DOG. 
times goods and other things have perforce 
to be left about, for householders and 
owners to keep fierce watch dogs, and turn 
them loose or keep them on a long chain, 
at night, as a guard against burglars and 
tramps. The danger of this proceeding is, 
however, that the natural sagacity of the 
dog does not enable him to discriminate 
with absolute infallibility, and particularly 
by night, between these trespassers and 
other persons who may be coming on lawful 
business; consequently any person who 
guards his property in this manner against 
one source of danger thereby runs the risk 
of being mulct in damages at the suit of an 
innocent person who has fallen a victim to 
his dog’s ferocity, “‘for although,” said 
Tindal, C.J., ““a man undoubtedly has a 
right to keep a fierce dog for the protection 
of his property, he has no right to put the 
dog in such a situation in the way of access 
to his house that a person innocently 
coming for a lawful purpose may be injured 
by it.” 
Now it is a well-established legal prin- 
ciple that he who keeps anything by 
nature dangerous (and a fierce dog is un- 
questionably dangerous), keeps it at his 
own peril. ‘“‘ Who ever,” said Lord Den- 
man, C.J. (in May v. Burdett, 9 Q.B. ror), 
“keeps an animal accustomed to attack 
and bite mankind, with knowledge that it 
is so accustomed, is prima facie liable in an 
action on the case, at the suit of any person, 
attacked and injured by the animal, without 
any averment of negligence or default in 
the securing or taking care of it.’ Nowa 
houscholder’s obligations towards persons 
coming upon his premises vary according 
to the class to which such persons happen 
to belong, or, in other words, according to 
what right they have to be upon the premises. 
A person may come upon lawful business or 
by invitation, and in this case the duties 
cast upon the householder are to see that the 
premises are reasonably secure, and to use 
proper care to prevent damage from unusual 
danger which he knew, or should have 
known of. He may come as a licensee, and 
here the only duty on the householder is to 
prevent danger of a latent character; i.e. 
