[264]. See Mason v. Keeling, 12 Mod. 332.
[265]. Besozzi v. Harris, 1 F. & F. 92; Texas R. Co. v. Juneman, 71 Fed. 939 (wild steer); Jackson v. Baker, 24 App. D. C. 100; Graham v. Payne, 122 Ind. 403 (ram); Marble v. Ross, 124 Mass. 44 (bull); Marquet v. La Duke, 96 Mich. 596; Phillips v. Garner, 106 Miss. 828; Manger v. Shipman, 30 Neb. 352; Van Leuven v. Lyke, 1 N. Y. 515; Mahoney v. Dwyer, 84 Hun, 348; Malloy v. Starin, 113 App. Div. 852 (reversed on other grounds, 191 N. Y. 21); Stamp v. Eighty-sixth St. Amusement Co., 95 Misc. 599 Accord.
Compare Hayes v. Miller, 150 Ala. 621, as to a wolf domesticated to such an extent that the owner believed it harmless.
As to the liability of the owner of bees, see O’Gorman v. O’Gorman, [1903] 2 I. R. 573; Parsons v. Manser, 119 Ia. 88; Petey Mfg. Co. v. Dryden, 5 Pennewill, 166; Lucas v. Pettit, 12 Ont. Law, 448; Notes in 97 Am. State Rep. 287, and 62 L. R. A. 132. Compare Earl v. Van Alstine, 8 Barb. 630; Olmsted v. Rich, 25 N. Y. St. Rep. 271; Arkadelphia v. Clark, 52 Ark. 23.
[266]. “Certain animals ferae naturae may doubtless be domesticated to such an extent as to be classed, in respect to the liability of the owner for injuries they commit, with the class known as tame or domestic animals; but inasmuch as they are liable to relapse into their wild habits and to become mischievous, the rule is that if they do so, and the owner becomes notified of their vicious habit, they are included in the same rule as if they had never been domesticated, the gist of the action in such a case, as in the case of untamed wild animals, being not merely the negligent keeping of the animal, but the keeping of the same with knowledge of the vicious and mischievous propensity of the animal.” Clifford, J., in Spring Company v. Edgar, 99 U. S. 645, 653.
[267]. See Bennet v. Bostock, 13 Scottish Sheriff Court Reports, 50; in the same direction with Scribner v. Kelley, 38 Barb. 14, cited in the foregoing opinion.
[268]. Kelley v. Killourey, 81 Conn. 320; Keightlinger v. Egan, 65 Ill. 235; Feldman v. Sellig, 110 Ill. App. 130; Donahue v. Scott Transfer Co., 141 Ill. App. 174; Bush v. Wathen, 104 Ky. 548; Quimby v. Woodbury, 63 N. H. 370; Badali v. Smith, (Tex. Civ. App.) 37 S. W. 642 Accord.
“There are expressions in some of the cases indicating that the liability of the owner is not affected by the negligence of the person injured.... If a person with full knowledge of the evil propensities of an animal wantonly excites him or voluntarily and unnecessarily puts himself in the way of such an animal, he would be adjudged to have brought the injury upon himself, and ought not to be entitled to recover. In such a case it cannot be said, in a legal sense, that the keeping of the animal, which is the gravamen of the offence, produced the injury.... But as the owner is held to a rigorous rule of liability on account of the danger to human life and limb, by harboring and keeping such animals, it follows that he ought not to be relieved from it by slight negligence or want of ordinary care [on the part of the plaintiff].... As negligence, in the ordinary sense, is not the ground of liability, so contributory negligence, in its ordinary meaning, is not a defence. These terms are not used in a strictly legal sense in this class of actions, but for convenience ... I think ... that the rule of liability before indicated is a reasonable one, and that the owner cannot be relieved from it by any act of the person injured, unless it be one from which it can be affirmed that he caused the injury himself, with a full knowledge of its probable consequences.” Church, C. J., in Muller v. McKesson, 73 N. Y. 195, 201, 202, 204.
So Woolf v. Chalker, 31 Conn. 121; Vredenberg v. Behan, 33 La. Ann. 627; Fake v. Addicks, 45 Minn. 37; Malloy v. Starin, 113 App. Div. 852.
Negligence of the person injured, see Graham v. Walsh, 14 Ga. App. 287; Buckley v. Gee, 55 Ill. App. 388; Milne v. Walker, 59 Ia. 186; Carpenter v. Latta, 29 Kan. 591; Tolin v. Terrell, 133 Ky. 210; Garland v. Hewes, 101 Me. 549; Twigg v. Ryland, 62 Md. 380; Spellman v. Dyer, 186 Mass. 176; Ryan v. Marren, 216 Mass. 556; Warrick v. Farley, 95 Neb. 565; Earhart v. Youngblood, 27 Pa. St. 331.