“Why, what do you mean?” was anxiously queried by several.
“Railway companies may stipulate for exemption from all responsibility for losses accruing to passengers from the negligence of their servants, unless, indeed, it arise from their fraudulent, reckless or wilful misconduct;[550] and where it has been agreed that, in consideration of a free pass, the passenger should travel at his own risk, or where he takes a free ticket having an express condition printed thereon ‘whereby the holder assumes all risk of accidents and expressly agrees that the company shall not be liable under any circumstances, whether of negligence by their agents or otherwise, for an injury to the person, or for any loss of or injury to the property,’ such agreement or condition is good, and will exclude all liability on the part of the company for any negligence (save gross or wilful)[551] for which they would otherwise have been liable. That has been held in Canada;[552] in New York State,[553] in other States, and in England the company is not even liable for wilful or gross negligence.[554] The words “travel at his own risk” include all the incidents connected with the journey; all those risks which arise during the transit and until the transit is actually at an end, are guarded by these words. So if a man, whose ticket is thus marked after leaving the train and while going off the company’s premises fall over a parapet and is injured, he will not be able to recover;[555] I mean to recover damages. But of course such an agreement does not extend to an independent wrong, as an assault or false imprisonment, or any rights as to criminal proceedings,[556] nor where the traveller is carried under an agreement between the company and some third party which says nothing about the traveller taking the risk himself.”[557]
“What’s the use in such a long palaver,” rudely interrupted my questioner, “the boy had no ticket at all.”
“Well, where a newsboy of the name of Billy Alexander, while on the platform of a station, was struck by a piece of wood projecting from a passing car and so hurt that he died, it was held to be a good defence that he was a newsboy in the employ of Chisholm, selling papers on the company’s trains under an agreement between Chisholm and the company, that the latter should not be liable for any injury to the newsboys or their goods, whether occasioned by the company’s negligence or otherwise.”[558]
“Do you mean to tell me,” cried a listener, indignantly, “that in this free land of ours the life of a child can thus be sold by his employer?”
“Ah,” I returned, “that is a question which Richards, C. J., did not decide. But if you want to know anything more on the subject call on me at my office, and I shall be most happy to attend to you,” I added, as I left the car.
I now retired to my berth in the Pullman, where the company was bound to keep both my-self and my goods in safety while I slept.[559] I was scarcely settled there ere I heard loud and angry voices proceeding from the front end of the car, and recognized our Hamitic conductor’s tones in the words—
“I tell you, sah, this is a sleeping car, and you can’t come in without a ticket.”
“Shure and I had a ticket, and its after slaping I want to be;” was the response in Milesian accents, broad and sweet.
“Whar is it?”