FIRE. The effect of combustion. Web ster, Diet.
The legal sense of the word is the same as the popular. 1 Pars. Marit. Law 231.
Where an insurance policy excluded lia bility for damages caused by explosions, un less fire ensues, a lighted match causing an explosion is not a fire ; Mitchell v. Ins. Co., 183 U. S. 42, 22 Sup. Ct. 22, 46 L. Ed. 74; nor is a lighted lamp ; United Life, Fire & Ma rine Ins. Co. v. Foote, 22 Ohio St. 340, 10 Am. Rep. 735 ; and to the same effect, Trans atlantic Fire Ins. Co. v. Dorsey, 56 Md. 40 Am. Rep. 403; Briggs v. Ins. Co., 53 N. Y. 446.
Fire is not a peril of the sea. In Scotch law, however, fire is an inevitable accident. Bell, Diet.
The ordinary meaning of the word as used iu an insurance policy includes the idea of visible heat or light. Damage to wool by spontaneous combustion with smoke and great heat, but without any visible flame or glow, is held not to be fire. The "fire is al ways caused by combustion, but combustion does not always cause fire." Western Wool en Mill Co. v. Assurance Co., 139 Fed. 637, 72 C. C. A. 1.
When a fire becomes uncontrollable and dangerous to the public, the destruction of a house is justified for the protection of the neighborhood; for the maxim salus popult est supreme leo applies in such case ; 11 Co. 13. See ACCIDENT ; EMINENT DOMAIN ; 3 Wms. Saund. 422 a, note 2 ; 3 Co. Litt. 57 a, n. 1; 1 Cruise, Dig. 151, 152 ; 1 Rolle, Abr. 1; Bacon, Abr. Action on the Case, F ; 2 Lois des Bdtim. 124; 1 Term 310; 6 if/. 489; Ambl. 619.
When real estate is let, and the tenant covenants to pay the rent during the term, unless there are proper exceptions to such covenants, and the premises are afterwards destroyed by fire during the term, the rent must be paid although there be no enjoy ment ; for the common rule prevails, res perit domino. The tenant, by the accident, loses his term ; the landlord, the residence; Story, Eq. Jur. § 102 ; Woodf. L. & T. 408.
The owner of property may kindle and have a fire on his own premises for any lawful purpose, such as burning waste in husbandry, without liability for injury to the property of another, if it is done with due care as to time, manner, and circum stances, and with respect to casual fires, also having due regard to the conditions of weather, wind, and proximity of inflam mable material ; Thomas, Negl. 640; Webb,
Poll. Torts 616, and note. Even in the ex treme case of one had been warned of h the danger that his haystack would take fire, and endanger others, the contention that the question should have been put to the jury whether he had acted bona fide, to the best of his judgment, and that the standard of ordinary prudence was too un certain as a criterion, was unsuccessfully pressed, and the care of a prudent man was held to be the proper measure of duty; 3 Bing. N. C. 468.
Very early in England, the duty of every man to safely keep his own fire was a stringent "custom of the realm," i. e. at common law ; Y. B. 2 Hen. IV. 18, pl. 6 ; and this, it is said, may be founded on ancient German custom, when a man carries fire more than nine feet from his hearth, only at his per il; Ll. Langob, cc. 147, 148 (A. D. 643) ; Poll. Torts 616. The rule applied as well to out-door fires, and in "a case grounded upon the common custom of the realm for negligently keeping his fire" ; 1 Ld. Raym. 264 ; e. c. 1 Salk. 13. Liability for domestic fires begun accidentally and without accident is removed in England by stats. of Anne and Geo. III. ; 11 Q. B. 347. The rule of modern times is affected by the increase of uses to which firs is applied, such as for mills, railroads, and the like, and in England the leading case of Rylands v. Fletch er, L. R. 3 H. L. 330 (which itself concerned a reservoir, hut the application of which has passed far beyond the class of facts on which it was deter mined), laid down •the rule "that the person who, for his own purposes, brings on his lands, and col lects and keeps there, anything likely to do mis chief if it escapes, must keep it in at his peril, and, if he does not do so, is prima facie answerable for all the damage which is the natural consequence of its escape." This principle was expressly applied to railroads ; L. IL 3 Q. B. 733 ; and to an engine brought on a highway ; 5 Q. B. Div. 597.