Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 12, 2025
The point which is essential to understanding the common-law theory of possession is now established: that all bailees from time immemorial have been regarded by the English law as possessors, and entitled to the possessory remedies. It is not strictly necessary to go on and complete the proof that our law of bailment is of pure German descent.
They tried to tell Jonas the whole story, and about Rollo's giving the fish to Henry, and its being a bailment. But they could not make Jonas understand it very well. He said he did not know any thing about bailment, except bailing out boats he had never heard of bailing fishes. Jonas accepted the office of cabinet keeper.
But it formed part of a consistent scheme for holding those who followed useful callings up to the mark. Another part was the liability of persons exercising a public employment for loss or damage, enhanced in cases of bailment by what remained of the rule in Southcote's Case. The scheme has given way to more liberal notions; but the disjecta membra still move.
"That is coming to the point exactly," said his father. "It all depends upon that, whether Henry had a right to reclaim his dipper at that time, after only lending it to Rollo. And that, you see, is another bailment case. Henry bailed Rollo the dipper. This shows the truth of what I said before, that a great many of the disputes among boys arise from cases of bailment.
"Well," said Rollo, who began to recall to mind the principles which his father had laid down upon the subject, "it was for his benefit, not mine, and so he ought to pay." All this conversation about bailment, and about its being for his benefit, not Rollo's, was entirely unintelligible to Henry, who had never studied the law of bailment at all.
She told him, first, that whenever one boy intrusted his property of any kind to the hands of another boy, it was a bailment; and that the question whether the one who took the thing ought to pay for it, if it was lost, depended upon the degree of care he took of it, considered in connection with the question, whether the bailment was for the benefit of the bailor, or the bailee.
Two notions have been entertained with regard to the source of this rule: one, that it was borrowed from the Roman law; /2/ the other, that it was introduced by custom, as an exception to the general law of bailment, in the reigns of Elizabeth and James I. /3/
The loss was not owing to inevitable accident. If the bailment was for Rollo's benefit, the care he took was sufficient to save him from being liable; but, if it was for his own benefit, then all he did was at his own risk; and the loss ought to be his loss, and he ought to pay for it." "But I don't see," said Mary, "that he was to blame in either case."
This is repeated in Southcote's Case, and appears to involve a double distinction, first between paid and unpaid bailees, next between bailees and servants. If the defendant was a servant not having control over the goods, he might not fall within the law of bailment, and factors are treated on the footing of servants in the early law.
The ground of liability was that the defendant had started upon the undertaking, so that his negligent omission, which let in the damage, could be connected with his acts as a part of his dealing with the thing. /3/ We shall find Lord Holt recognizing this original purport of assumpsit when we come to Coggs v. Bernard. Of course it was not confined to cases of bailment.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking