The surface of the step felt very slippery. * * * The front of the foot slipped right over a slippery substance." There was nothing to indicate what this substance was or how long it had been there. No witness saw it or described it. The testimony was that there was on the stairs "simply the sweeping * * * nothing except dust in it; just a little bunch where the porter was sweeping. There was no skid mark on the stairs."

* *

There was no evidence of negligence on the part of the defendant. The case is governed by numerous decisions. * Exceptions overruled.

SECTION 3.-INCEPTION AND TERMINATION OF THE RELATION OF COMMON CARRIER OF PASSENGERS

HANSLEY v. JAMESVILLE & W. R. CO.

(Supreme Court of North Carolina, 1894. 115 N. C. 602, 20 S. E. 528, 32 L. R. A. 543, 44 Am. St. Rep. 474.)

AVERY, J. * * * The contract of carriage begins when the passenger comes upon the carrier's premises, or upon its means of conveyance, with a purpose of purchasing a ticket within a reasonable time, or after having purchased a ticket. The relation once constituted continues until the journey, expressly or impliedly contracted for, has been concluded, and the passenger has left the carrier's premises, or has been allowed a reasonable time to leave such premises. 2 Am. & Eng. Encyc. of Law, 742-745. There is always on the creation of a relation an agreement, express or implied, or a legal obligation to perform the stipulation of the contract by transporting the passenger in accordance with the published schedule, or within a reasonable time. Hutchinson on Carriers, § 603 et seq.

**

GLENN v. LAKE ERIE & W. R. CO.

(Supreme Court of Indiana, 1905. 165 Ind. 659, 75 N. E. 282, 2 L. R. A. [N. S.] 872, 112 Am. St. Rep. 255, 6 Ann. Cas. 1032.)

MONTGOMERY, J. This action was brought by appellant to recover for a personal injury caused by falling over a railroad tie upon appellee's station grounds. The cause was tried by a jury, and after hearing the evidence and argument of counsel, the court by a peremptory instruction directed the jury to return a verdict in favor of appellee. Appellant's motion for a new trial was overruled and an exception duly saved, and that ruling assigned as error on appeal.

Appellant resided at the town of Dayton, and at the time of receiving his injury was returning from a trip to the city of LaFayette. The complaint is in a single paragraph, and alleges that appellant was a passenger over appellee's road from LaFayette to Dayton and arrived at his destination after night, and, in going from the depot toward the business part of town, in the darkness, fell over the obstruction and broke his leg. Appellant's right of action is manifestly founded upon

the relation of passenger and carrier, and if that relation did not exist between him and the appellee at the time of the accident there can be no recovery upon the complaint.

The rule is that the relation of passenger and carrier, when established, does not terminate until the passenger has reached his destination, alighted from the train, and had a reasonable time in which to leave the place where passengers are discharged. *

* *

In case of an accident involving a passenger who on alighting from the train intended and desired to depart from the place at once, but was hindered and delayed, the question as to what is a reasonable time should be determined from the attendant facts and circumstances given in explanation or excuse for such delay. In this case, appellant on arriving at Dayton and leaving the train, had no apparent desire to proceed on his journey, and offered no legitimate excuse for lingering about the station; but it appears from his own statement that he voluntarily went into the waiting room of the station with six or seven acquaintances, sat down, talked, joked, sang a song, and had a jolly time for ten or fifteen minutes. He was not detained after leaving the car by any business with the company or connected with his journey, or by any circumstance which made delay either necessary or expedient, but to secure amusement for himself and to furnish entertainment for his companions he abstained from proceeding homeward. After ten or fifteen minutes thus jovially spent, appellant left the depot, and in passing over the station grounds fell and was injured. The admissions of the appellant, as well as the other evidence, make it clear that he merely loitered for an unreasonable time about the station for his own pleasure, and it was wholly unnecessary to ask the jury to determine as a question of fact whether ten or fifteen minutes was an unreasonable time for him to remain at the place where he was discharged as a passenger from appellee's train. The court, upon the undisputed facts, could say as a matter of law that, upon his arrival at the station, appellant of his own volition, in quest of pleasure, broke the continuity of his journey, and thereby terminated at once his relation as appellee's passenger. Appellant's right of recovery, as pleaded, depended upon proof of a breach of duty owing by appellee to him as its passenger, and, that relation having terminated before the accident occurred resulting in his injury, his suit must fail. The court did not err in directing a verdict for appellee.

The judgment is affirmed.

* * *

SECTION 4.-WHAT IS BAGGAGE

KANSAS CITY, FT. S. & G. R. CO. v. MORRISON.

(Supreme Court of Kansas, 1886. 34 Kan. 502, 9 Pac. 225, 55 Am. Rep. 252.)

Plaintiff sues the railroad company for $495.12 damages for the loss of certain wearing apparel and tools placed by the plaintiff in a trunk and sent over the line of the defendant as baggage, to be carried over defendant's line from Fort Scott to Parsons, the plaintiff being a passenger for the same trip. Judgment below for plaintiff. Defendant appeals.

HORTON, C. J. * * * If plaintiff demanded his baggage, as testified to, and the company, having the trunk at its depot at Parsons, refused to deliver it, the company is responsible to the owner for its contents, although the trunk was subsequently broken open and robbed without its fault. The liability of the railroad company was coextensive with its custody of the trunk, and continued until it was safely delivered into the hands of its owner, if the owner called for and demanded the trunk within a reasonable time after it reached Parsons. All of this was done by the owner. * * *

We think, therefore, that there is only one principal question presented by the record for our determination; that is, whether the tools of plaintiff below are proper baggage for a watchmaker and jeweler. · The general rule is, that the implied obligation of a common carrier to carry the baggage of a passenger does not extend beyond ordinary baggage; and it may be said generally that by baggage we are to understand such articles of personal convenience or necessity as are usually carried by passengers for their personal use, and not merchandise or other valuables, although carried in the trunks of passengers, which are not, however, designed for any such use, but for other purposes, such as a sale and the like. * The decisions on the subject of passengers' baggage turn upon the question: What articles may baggage consist of? This is a mixed question of law and fact, to be determined by the jury under proper instructions from the court. In Macrow v. Railway Co., 2 L. R. 6 Q. B. 612, the question coming before the court as to what was properly included by the term baggage, the true rule was said by Cockburn, C. J., to be: "That whatever the passenger takes with him for his personal use or convenience, according to the habits or wants of the particular class to which he belongs, either with reference to the immediate necessities or to the ultimate purpose of the journey, must be considered as personal luggage. This would include, not only all articles of apparel, whether for use or ornament, but also the gun case or fishing apparatus of the sportsman, the easel of the artist on a sketching tour, or the books of the student, and other articles of an analogous character, the use of which is personal to the traveller, and the taking of which has arisen from the fact of his journeying. But merchandise, or furniture, or household goods, would not come within the description of ordinary luggage. unless accepted as such by the carrier."

* * *

* * *

It is also held by the authorities that a reasonable quantity of his tools is proper baggage for a mechanic. The case of Davis v. Railroad Co., supra [10 How. Prac. (N. Y.) 330], and Porter v. Hildebrand, supra [14 Pa. 129], are cited by Thompson in his work on Carriers, and also by Hutchison in his book on the same subject; and are also referred to in other text-books without criticism or other unfavorable comment. Thompson on Carriers, 513; Hutchinson on Carriers, § 683.

These cases are quite similar to the one at bar, excepting that the tools in controversy are more valuable. In Davis v. Railroad Co., the contents of the trunk consisted of ordinary wearing apparel, a gun, and a set of harness maker's tools, worth ten dollars. The plaintiff was a harness maker by trade, and it was proved that it is usual for those of that trade, in going from place to place, to take their tools with them in their trunks. In Porter v. Hildebrand, the plaintiff was a carpenter, and his trunk contained $45 of clothing and $55 worth of carpenters' tools. He was moving from Pennsylvania to the State of Ohio, and he

*

delivered his trunk to the owners of a stage to carry it from Pittsburgh to Wooster, Ohio. In that case the court, speaking through Bell, J., said: "Another question disclosed by the record is, whether a recovery can be had for the value of the carpenter's tools, which the jury have found were a reasonable part of the plaintiff's baggage. The right to carry tools as baggage is unquestionably open to abuse; but in the language of the court in McGill v. Rowand, 3 Barr, 451, the correction is to be found in the intelligence and integrity of the jury called to determine under the circumstances of each case. It is, it is said, a common thing for journeymen mechanics to carry in their trunks, with clothing, a small and select portion of their tools. To this practice I see no such objection as ought to put this kind of property out of the protection afforded to the necessaries a traveller is compelled by legitimate considerations to transport with his person. Upon this score, the judgment rendered below is, I think, unobjectionable."

The evidence shows that plaintiff below was a watchmaker and jeweler, that he went to Parsons to work at watchmaking, that the tools in his trunk were intended for repairing watches and were necessary for his work, and that they were the tools usually carried by a person of his trade or occupation. The plaintiff is therefore, strictly speaking, a mechanic, and a reasonable quantity of his tools is proper baggage. * What was a reasonable quantity of tools for plaintiff below to carry, was a question for the jury.

*

The judgment of the District Court must be affirmed.

CENTRAL OF GEORGIA RY. CO. v. COURSON.

(Court of Appeals of Alabama, 1913. 10 Ala. App. 581, 65 So. 698.)

Courson sues the Central of Georgia Railway Company. Judgment for plaintiff below.

WALTER, P. J. * * Each of the counts of the complaint seeks to enforce the contract liability incurred by the defendant as a common carrier by its sale of a ticket to the plaintiff as a passenger and the issuance to him of a check for a trunk delivered as baggage. There was no evidence tending to prove that the defendant knew or was informed of what the trunk contained. Its liability as a common carrier for the passenger's baggage did not extend to things in the trunk which were not baggage. The undisputed evidence was to the effect that the quilts, feather pillows, bedticking, pillow cases, and sheets which were in the trunk were intended by the plaintiff for use "in and about his housekeeping when he reached his home." There was no evidence tending to prove that it was in the contemplation of the plaintiff to make use of any of those articles at any stage of his journey. They were intended for use only in his home after his journey was ended. This being true, they were not baggage, and as to them the defendant was not subject to the liability with which it was sought to be charged. This conclusion as to such articles intended only for uses. having no connection with the passenger's journey is so supported by authority that further discussion of the question is deemed to be superfluous. * *

The court erred in refusing to give charges 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5, requested by the defendant.

Reversed and remanded.

SECTION 1.-INTRODUCTION

During the present period, when such a large amount of business is done on a credit basis, it is highly important for the student of business to know something of the law of lien relationships. Almost all liens arise by contract, express or implied, except, in a few cases, where the law expressly says that a lien exists in the absence of an agreement to the contrary. Once the lien relationship is established, many questions arise as to the rights of the lienholder. How long will the lien continue? What must be done to protect third parties? What are the rights of the owner of the property against which the lien exists? These and many other questions will be answered in the cases that follow.

Although in many cases the various states have enacted statutes which have created liens that did not exist at common law, yet most of them provide that the old common-law lien shall not be extingguished. For this reason a study is first made of the common-law lien.