RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT, AHAURA.

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1215, 20 June 1872, Page 3

RESIDENT MAGISTRATE'S COURT, AHAURA.

Monday, June 17. (Before 0. Whitefoord, Esq., R.M.) ' Three inebriates were fined in the usual penalty for being drunk and disorderly. Wm. Cobbett was charged with breaking the window of the Post Office. The accused did not deny the charge, but said he had no recollection of committing the offence. He further drew attention to the fact of being locked up for 24 hours, and owing to the too efficient ventilation of the lock-up, he was ," frozen stiff with the cold." On paying L 2, to repair the damage done, the defendant was cautioned and discharged. Catherine Gardiner was charged with assaulting Isabella Nidd, at Half-Ounce, on 9th June. The evidence of the complainant and another witness was taken, from which it appeared a brutal and unprovoked assault had been committed. The defendant did pot appear, and a Warrant w«8 watted for her arrest, . CIVIL OASES. Mackley v. Groom. — An action to recover L 24, the value of a horse lost in February, 1868. This was a re-hearing, ordered by Judge Richmond at the last sitting of the Supreme Court* at Hokitiko, when the present case came before him as an appeal from the decision of the Resident Magistrate at Ahaura. The evidence has been before published at length. The plaintiff is a runholder, at Waipuna, in the Upper Grey. The defendant, at the time the action arose, was superintending the construction of a road for the Nelson Government, and the works were going on about five miles above the plaintiffs station. The plaintiff was gathering in his harvest, and the defendant came to the station on business, and, as the plaintiff alleges, offered to assist at the haymaking if the plaintiff wppjd lpnd him a horse to proceed to the oamp where his workmen were, promising to return the same night. There was a discrepancy in the evidence for the plaintiff, and the defendant won this point. The defendant said that he was specially requested to assist the plaintiff to get in his hay, and that in taking the horse, he was in fact acting beneficially for the plaintiff, because by doing so he would be able to get back from his camp without delay, assist at the work, which was of urgent necessity, on account of nature of the weather. There was a good deal of evidence taken on. this point, and also as to the value of the horse ; but in reality it was not material. The issue to be tried was, according to the Judge's direction, " Did the defendant, while the horse was in his possession, use ordinary care, having regard to the necessities of the case and the custom of the country?" The question of bailment was considered As settled, because it was not denied that the defendant took away the horse, and intended to return it. The plaintiff alleged that the defendant did not use prdjpary care,(on the contrary, his actions amounted to gross negligence. The defendant took tine horse over an unfinished and dangerous portion of the new road, and turned it adrift. It wandered back to a certain place, which it could not pass. It then turned off the track to the Btation, which ii was endeavoring to follow, and, going into the river bed, it got drowned or killed in a gorge through which it tried to pass. The defendant denied this. He said he took the horse to the end of the workings at that time, and he would not have done so if the track had been unsafe. It was too latejto return to Mackley's, and he turned the horse out at a place where there was a little grass. He took precautions to prevent the straying, \ix\\ did not tie it up. In the morning at daylight lip found the horse was gone, and some of his men and himself went to search for it, but could not find it, although they saw home tracks going in the direction of the station. This evidence was corroborated by a witness named Andrew Grey, who was working for the defendant m 1868. The plaintiff and defendant want, a few days afterwards, to search for the hone. After they were searching some time, the plaintiff went home, and the defendant alleges that, after the plaintiff left, he saw the horse on the station side of the river, and below the gorge, on the opposite side to where he (defendant) was standing, but although he attempted, to, cross to where the horse was, he could Sot 4Q *° °wing to the flooded state of lie river. The evidence of Enoch Orchard, a cattle dealer, was taken as to the custom of persons travelling in the bush " with cattle or horses. He said horses were generally turned adrift to feed, and only in special cases were they tied or tethered. The witness also proved the correctness of the plans of the locality which were put in. The Magistrate, in giving judgment, said the case, owing to the additional evidence introduced, differed in certain points, and had almost assumed a new aspect since }t wag previously before the Court. The question of bailment was now to be considered, and the only matter the Court had to decide, according to the ruling of the Judge, wa a

whether the defendant had exercised ordinary care with his charge. The evidence adduced for the defence showed that there were not any natural difficulties in the way of the horse reaching home when it strayed from the place the defendant left it. The evidence of Orchard showed it was the custom to allow horses to remain untethered, so that they could feed ; and the plaintiff, although he did not directly swear to the words, did not deny that he might have told the defendant " to throw the reins on the horse's neck, and it would find its way home." He was of opinion, on carefully considering all the circumstances, that the defendant did use reasonable care and caution, and treated the horse as if it had been his ovrn property. Judgment for the defendant with costs. Mr Guinness for the plaintiff, Mr Staite for the defendant.