Unpunctuality.— When company liable.—The right of a passenger to be carried to his destination, and that without unreasonable delay, is mainly created and defined by his contract of carriage with the company. This contract is found in the ticket with which he is supplied upon payment of the fare, in the conditions indorsed thereon, and in the further conditions (if any) con tained in the company's official time-table book, and to which he is generally expressly referred by the conditions on the ticket. Thus, on the face of the ticket usually appear the words "see back," and on its back an announcement to the effect that the ticket is " issued subject to the conditions stated on the company's time bills." Upon referring to these conditions the passenger will find, as a rule, a clause declaring that " the company will not be responsible or accountable for any loss or injury which may arise from delay, unless such delay is caused by the wilful misconduct of the company's servants." This clause is certainly not to be read as though the company had said, "We will be liable in no case." Its meaning is simply this : " If you, as a passenger, have incurred any loss, inconvenience, or injury by reason of delay or detention, we will com pensate you if you prove it is by the wilful misconduct of our servants, but otherwise not." It naturally does not exclude a company from any liability in respect of misstatements in their time-table. Thus, in Denton v. Ry. Co., the plaintiff booked with the defendant company from Peterborough to Hull, on the strength of a statement in that company's current time-tables that the train leaving Peterborough at 7 P.M. would catch a G.-E. Ry. train at Milford Junc tion, by which he could reach Hull at a certain hour about midnight. As a matter of fact that connection at Milford Junction had been discontinued, no intimation thereof appearing in the time-tables. As a result of this the plaintiff was unable to get to Hull in time to transact his intended business, and thereby suffered damage to the extent of £5, 10s. The action was against the G.-N. Ry. Co. to recover this sum, and the plaintiff succeeded. The Court held that the time-tables amounted to a contract, and found that the representation as to the connection at Milford Junction was false. In delivering judgment, Lord Camp bell said : " It is all one, as if a person duly authorised by the company had, knowing it was not true, said to the plaintiff, There is a train from Milford Junction to Hull at that hour.' The plaintiff believes this, acts upon it, and sustains loss. It is well-established law that where a person makes an untrue statement, knowing it to be untrue, to another, who is induced to act upon it, an action lies. The facts bring the present case within that rule," Except, however, where there is misrepresentation in the contract, a com pany is entitled to rely upon its limiting condition. But even then it must not be thought that proof of wilful misconduct of the company's servants is a matter of very great difficulty. Assuming that the conditions of traffic are normal, and yet there is an extraordinary delay, which the company cannot explain by refer ence to unexpected, unusual, or abnormal events, a jury would be entitled to infer therefrom the wilful misconduct of some known or unknown employee of the company. Reasonable punctuality is practically obligatory, notwithstanding any condition or bye-law of a company. A case where the plaintiff was unable to prove misconduct, or even an unreasonable or extraordinary delay, and so could not recover the damages he claimed, is that of Woodgate v. Ry. Co. There the plaintiff' started from Paddington for Bridgnorth, a station on a branch line, and the company stated that the journey would take about six hours. As a matter of fact ten hours had elapsed before the plaintiff arrived at his destina tion. But as further matters of fact, which operated in favour of the company and prevented the plaintiff from succeeding in his action, were the time of the year— it was Christmas Eve, an abnormal circumstance—there had been a collision on the line, and an elemental obstacle—the night was a very foggy one. Elemental difficulties, such as fog, flood, snow, and so forth, are always strong defences in actions against railway companies for damages for unpunctuality (Hurst v. Ry. Co.). Of a somewhat similar character to such actions are those wherein the plaintiff has suffered damage because, when about to proceed by an advertised train, he discovers that he must abandon his journey by reason of the train being already too full to accommodate him. The companies, however, very effectively meet such cases by advertising that they do not guarantee accommodation, that the ticket is issued subject to that understanding, and that if a ticket-holder is so prevented from proceeding his fare will be returned to him. But apart from this express limitation of liability it has been held, in Hawcroft v. G.-N. Ry. Co., that an action may be maintained by a traveller for whom, though the train starts as advertised, there is no room. In that case the plaintiff was a Barnsley confectioner, who took an excursion return ticket to go up to London and see the Great Exhibition of 1851. " The excursion train by which he proposed on a Saturday morning to return was so full that he could not get a seat, and as the company would not allow him to go by one of their ordinary trains, he was kept at King's Cross Station till late in the evening. When at last he did get a train, he found that it took him no farther than Doncaster, where he arrived on Sunday morning. The Barnsley confectioner, however, wanted to get back to his family as quickly as possible, so (there being no Sunday trains) he hired a carriage and drove from Doncaster to Barnsley. Under these circumstances the company were held liable. do not think,' said Patterson, J., 'that they had any right to keep him in London until the 9.4.5 evening train. They should have sent another train. The case finds that they might have done so without danger.' " Damages.—Though it is often a difficult task to decide with any degree of confidence whether a delay is such as will render a company liable to an action for damages, it is yet, perhaps, still more difficult to state definitely what damages the Court is prepared to allow in such a case. The general principle is that where one party to a contract fails to perform his obligatioxr to the other thereunder the other party is entitled to do for himself, as far as possible, what the other party should have done, and to charge the latter with his expenses in so doing. This, however, is subject to the proviso that the party injured by the breach must, when remedying it himself, act reasonably and not oppressively. A man who is going for a fortnight's holiday at Scarborough, for instance, and, through the railway company's negligence, misses a connection and is thereby forced to lose an hour or two in waiting for another train, is certainly not entitled to take a special train and charge the negligent company with the expense of it. Such was the unreasonable conduct of the plaintiff in Le Blanche v. L. and N.-IV. By., and lie was probably the only person who was surprised— if indeed lie was—at the Court refusing to allow his claim. His conduct was certainly more unreasonable than that of the Barnsley confectioner who, forced by a real necessity, was content to proceed to his destination by road. Hotel
expenses, when the necessary result of a company's breach of their duty, are, as a general rule, recoverable from the defaulting company. But these expenses must be proportioned to the particular circumstances of the case and the social position of the passenger. It is improbable that a delayed farm labourer, for example, could recover the expense of putting up at a high class and expensive hotel when he had every opportunity to go to an hotel more suitable to his position. And, generally speaking, such expenses as those just enumerated, of reasonably remedying the breach or of staying at an hotel, are all that a delayed passenger can recover. Perhaps, occasionally, some nominal damages may be recovered in respect of inconvenience. Certainly, in a recent case of un reasonable delay in the starling of a train (Cooke v. M. 1?y. Co.), a miner was permitted to recover a day's wages which he had thereby lost, but this must be taken to be an exception to the rule. Arid again, in Buckmaster v. G.-E. Ry. Co., a farmer obtained LIO for loss of business at a market ; but here the circum stances were undoubtedly exceptional, for the train was a special one run regularly to serve that market and the farmer was a season-ticket holder in respect of it, and consequently the company might be assumed to have contracted with him with special regard to his attendance at the market. But, on the other hand, the integrity of the rule was maintained in the case of Hamlin v. G.-N. Ry. Co., where the delayed passenger, who was travelling to keep a business appointment, was only allowed his hotel expenses and nominal damages, and was held not entitled to recover anything in respect of the loss he had suffered in consequence of not having kept his appointment.
In cases where delayed passengers have suffered a " secondary " injury after the breach of a railway company's contract, there is apparently some conflict of judicial opinion. Thus, where through such a breach a lady had to undertake a long midnight walk and, as a consequence, caught a severe cold and suffered an illness, the Court refused to allow any damages in respect of the cold and illness, on the ground that they were too remote and were not the probable result of the breach. She was only allowed nominal damages for the incon venience (Hobbs v. L. and S.-IV. By. Co.). In the case of McMahon v. Field, which bears on the question of consequential damages, Lord Justice Bramwell referred to that lady's case and said : "I must say I do not see why a passenger who, by the default of the railway company, was obliged to walk home in the dark, might not recover in respect of such damage [as she had in fact sustained], it being an event which might not unreasonably be expected to occur." Damages for default in carriage of goods.—The law on this point is laid down in Hadley v. Baxendale. There the defendants, who were carriers, were sued for the delay in the delivery of a broken shaft, part of the machinery of a mill which had to stop work because of the breakage, the broken shaft having been sent to serve as a pattern for a new shaft. In consequence of the delay the new shaft was itself delayed in completion and delivery, the stoppage of the plaintiffs' mill was continued for a longer period, and the profits which they would otherwise have made were lost. The defendants were not aware of the special circumstances of the case, and that delay meant such a loss. It was decided that the loss of profit, caused by the continued stoppage of the mill, could not be recovered. The following rule was laid down :—" When two parties have made a contract, which one of them has broken, the damages which the other party ought to receive in respect of such breach of contract should be (1) such as may fairly and reasonably be considered either as arising naturally, i.e. according to the usual course of things from such breach of contract itself; or (2) such as may be reasonably supposed to have been in the contemplation of both parties, at the time they made the contract, as the probable result of the breach of it. If the special circumstances under which the contract was made were communicated by the plaintiffs to the defendants, and thus be known to both parties, the damages resulting from the breach of such a contract, which they would reasonably contemplate, would be the amount of injury which would ordinarily follow from a breach of contract under these special circumstances, so known and communicated. But, on the other hand, if these special circumstances were wholly unknown to the party breaking the contract, he at the most could only be supposed to have had in his contemplation the amount of injury which would arise generally, and in the great multitude of cases not affected by any special circumstances, from such a breach of contract." Referring to the case of Simpson v. L. and N.-TV. 17y. Co., wherein certain samples of spice were delivered too late for a show [see vol. ii. p. 77], the learned author of Mayne on Damages observes that notwithstanding some :xpressions in the judgment therein, "it appears that the case really came order the first rule in Hadley v. Baxendale. . .. Goods are consigned with a !ontract that they are to be delivered at a particular place on a particular day. Ile contract is broken. What are the damages ? They are the damages laturally arising from the non-arrival of the particular sort of goods. The vidence as to knowledge simply went to show that the defendants knew what ;ort of goods they were. A carrier will be liable to different damages according is he delays a basket of fish or a basket of coals, for the simple reason that lelay frustrates the object of sending the fish, but not that of sending the coals. Here the plaintiff claimed no special damages, but merely general damages for ;he failure of his object in sending the goods." Oppressive rates and treatment.—A railway company must not treat ,hose for whom it carries goods in an unfair or oppressive manner. Any person who receives, sends, or desires to send goods by a railway should complain to the Board of Trade if he is of opinion that the railway is " charging him an unfair n. unreasonable rate of charge, or is in any other respect treating him in an )ppressive or unreasonable manner." This facility for complaint is provided by Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1888, which also confers a power upon the Board )f Trade, if they think there is a reasonable ground for complaint, to call upon le railway company for an explanation, and to endeavour to settle amicably the lifferences between the complainant and the company. But the Board of Trade lave no power to enforce their decisions ; they cannot do more than express their dews to the parties. They are bound, however, by statute, to submit to parlia nent reports of the complaints made to them, and the results of the yroceedings aken thereon, together with their observations. And if the complaint is one of :he unreasonableness of a rate or charge which has been directly or indirectly ncreased by a railway company since the 31st December 1892, and the Board of Grade are unable to effect an amicable settlement, then the complainant has the •fight, under the Railway and Canal Traffic Act, 1894, to submit his complaint to ;he Railway and Canal Commissioners for their adjudication.