Source: https://www.paisley.org.uk/paisley-history/donoghue-v-stevenson-snail-in-a-bottle/
Timestamp: 2019-04-23 04:33:46+00:00

Document:
When a dead slug was found at the bottom of a drink in a café in Paisley it went on to shape the legal rights of consumers not just in Scotland but all around the world.
May Donoghue and a friend met for an ice-cream at Frankie Minghella’s “Tally café” in Wellmeadow Place.
Her friend ordered a “pear and ice” and a ginger beer float for Mrs Donoghue.
After consuming most of her ginger beer Mrs Donoghue was horrified to discover a decomposed slug in her drink.
Mrs Donoghue suffered from shock and later had to be treated for gastro-enteritis. She then decided to take action against the café owner.
But Mr Minghella teh owner insisted that as Mrs Donoghue had not bought the drink herself, he did not owe her a “duty of care” and she had no grounds on which to base her complaint.
In a move which changed everything, Mrs Donoghue decided to sue the manufacturer of the ginger beer instead, Paisley drink maker David Stevenson.
The case lasted four years, her lawyer William Leechman claiming that the slug must have crawled into the bottle when in storage before being filled.
His argument centred on the fact that Stevenson had a “duty of care” to the consumer, even without a direct contract.
Mrs Donoghue was awarded £200 in compensation, the equivalent of £7,400 today.
Her win was established as a legal case study and has been used in every court action where a person suffers injury or loss.
Millions of damages actions around the world now regularly begin with ruling in the Paisley slug case.
The expression “Gie’s a slug (drink) ae yer ginger (lemonade)” refer.
The café building in Wellmeadow Place where the incident took place was demolished in the 1960s but the legacy remains forever enshrined in the law.
Courtesy of our partners at Paisley Mysteries.
Die Jovis, 26° Maii, 1932.
The facts of this case are simple.
On August 26th, 1928, the Appellant drank a bottle of ginger beer, manufactured by the Respondent, which a friend had bought from a retailer and given to her. The bottle contained the decomposed remains of a snail which were not and could not be detected until the greater part of the contents of the bottle had been consumed. As a result she alleged and, at this stage her allegations must be accepted as true, that she suffered from shock and severe gastro enteritis. She accordingly instituted the proceedings against the manufacturers which have given rise to this appeal.
“We should pause before we make a precedent by our decision which would be an authority for an action against the vendors even of such instruments and articles as are dangerous in themselves at the suit of any person whomsoever into whose hands they might happen to pass and who should be injured thereby, and in Longmeid v. Holliday , 5 Ex., 761, the same eminent Judge points out that the earlier case was based on a fraudulent misstatement, and he expressly repudiates the view that it has any wider application.
It is true that he uses the words “lent or given” and omits the word; “sold”, but if the duty be entirely independent of contract and is a duty owed to a third person, it seems to me the same whether the article be originally given or sold. The fact in the present case that the ginger beer originally left the premises of the manufacturer on a purchase as was probably the case cannot add to his duty, if such existed, to take care in its preparation.
As to (1), in the case of things dangerous in themselves, there is, in the words of Lord Dunedin, “a peculiar duty to take precaution imposed on those who send forth or instal such articles when it is necessarily the case that other parties will come within their proximity” — Dominion Gas Coy. v. Collins , 1909, A.C., 640. And as to (2) this depends on the fact that the knowledge of the danger creates the obligation to warn, and its concealment is in the nature of fraud.
In this case no one can suggest the ginger beer was an article dangerous in itself, and the words of Lord Dunedin show that the duty attaches only to such articles, for I read the words “a peculiar duty” as meaning a duty peculiar to the special class of subject mentioned.
“Substitute the word ‘negligent’ for ‘fraud’ and the analogy between Langridge v. Levy and this case is complete”.
It is unnecessary to point out too emphatically that such a substitution cannot possibly be made. No action based on fraud can be supported by mere proof of negligence.
“The recognised cases” to which the Master of the Rolls refers are not definitely quoted, but they appear to refer to cases of collision and carriage and the cases of visitation to premises on which there is some hidden danger, cases far removed from the doctrine he enunciates. None the less this passage has been used as a tabula in naufragio for many litigants struggling in the seas of adverse authority. It cannot, however, be divorced from the fact that the case had nothing whatever to do with the question of manufacture and sale. An unsound staging had been erected on premises to which there had been an invitation to the plaintiffs to enter and the case really depended on the duty of the owner of the premises to persons so invited. None the less it is clear that Lord Esher considered the cases of manufactured articles, for he examined Langridge v. Levy , and says that it does not negative the proposition that the case might nave been supported on the ground of negligence.
In my view, therefore, the authorities are against the Appellant’s contention, and apart from authority it is difficult to see how any common law proposition can be formulated to support her claim.
The sole question for determination in this case is legal: do the averments made by the pursuer in her pleading if true disclose a cause of action? I need not restate the particular facts. The question is whether the manufacturer of an article of drink sold by him to a distributor in circumstances which prevent the distributor or the ultimate purchaser or consumer from discovering by inspection any defect is under any legal duty to the ultimate purchaser or consumer to take reasonable care that the article is free from defect likely to cause injury to health. I do not think a more important problem has occupied your Lordships in your judicial ‘capacity: important both because of its bearing on public health and because of the practical test which it applies to the system of law under which it arises. The case has to be determined in accordance with Scots Law: but it has been a matter of agreement between the experienced counsel who argued this case, and it appears to be the basis of the judgments of the learned judges of the Court of Session that for the purposes of determining this problem the law of Scotland and of England are the same. I speak with little authority on this point, but my own research such as it is satisfies me that the principles of the law of Scotland on such a question as the present are identical with those of English law: and I discuss the issue on that footing. The law of both countries appears to be that in order to support an action for damages for negligence the complainant has to show that he has been injured by the breach of a duty owed to him in the circumstances by the defendant to take reasonable care to avoid such injury. In the present case we are not concerned with the breach of the duty; if a duty exists that would be a question of fact which is sufficiently averred and for present purposes must be assumed. We are solely concerned with the question whether as a matter of law in the circumstances alleged the defender owed any duty to the pursuer to take care.
I draw particular attention to the fact that Lord Esher emphasizes the necessity of goods having to be “used immediately” and “used at once before a reasonable opportunity of inspection.” This is obviously to exclude the possibility of goods having their condition altered by lapse of time; and to call attention to the proximate relationship, which may be too remote where inspection even of the person using, certainly of an intermediate person, may reasonably be interposed. With this necessary qualification of proximate relationship as explained in Le Lievre v. Gould , 1893, 1 Q.B. 491, I think the judgment of Lord Esher expresses the law of England; without the qualification I think that the majority of the Court in Heaven v. Pender were justified in thinking the principle as expressed in too general terms. There will no doubt arise cases where it will be difficult to determine whether the contemplated relationship is so close that the duty arises. But in the class of case now before the Court I cannot conceive any difficulty to arise. A manufacturer puts up an article of food in a container which he knows will be opened by the actual consumer. There can be no inspection by any purchaser and no reasonable preliminary inspection by the consumer. Negligently in the course of preparation he allows the contents to be mixed with poison. It is said that the law of England and Scotland is that the poisoned consumer has no remedy against the negligent manufacturer. My Lords, if this were the result of the authorities I should consider the result a grave defect in the law, and so contrary to principle that I should hesitate long before following any decision to that effect which had not the authority of this House. I would point out that in the assumed state of the authorities not only would the consumer have no remedy against the manufacturer, he would have none against anyone else, for in the circumstances alleged there would be no evidence of negligence against anyone other than the manufacturer; and except in the case of a consumer who was also a purchaser no contract and no warranty of fitness and in the case of the purchase of a specific article under its patent or trade name, which might well be the case in the purchase of some articles of food or drink, no warranty protecting even the purchaser-consumer. There are other instances than of articles of food and drink where goods are sold intended to be used immediately by the consumer, such as many forms of goods sold for cleaning purposes, when the same liability must exist. The doctrine supported by the decision below would not only deny a remedy to the consumer who was injured by consuming bottled beer or chocolates poisoned by the negligence of the manufacturer, but also to the user of what should be a harmless proprietary medicine, an ointment, a soap, a cleaning fluid or cleaning powder. I confine myself to articles of common household use, where everyone including the manufacturer knows that the articles will be used by other persons than the actual ultimate purchaser, viz., by members of his family and his servants, and in some oases his guests. My Lords, I do not think so ill of our jurisprudence as to suppose that its principles are so remote from the ordinary needs of civilised society and the ordinary claims it makes upon its members as to deny a legal remedy where there is so obviously a social wrong.
In my opinion several decided cases support the view that in such a case as the present the manufacturer owes a duty to the consumer to be careful. A direct authority is George v. Skivington L.R. 5 Ex. 1. That was a decision on a demurrer to a declaration which averred that the defendant professed to sell a hair wash made by himself and that the plaintiff Joseph George bought a bottle to be used by his wife, the plaintiff Emma George, as the defendant then knew and that the defendant had so negligently conducted himself in preparing and selling the hairwash that it was unfit for use whereby the female plaintiff was injured. Kelly C.B. said that there was no question of warranty but whether the chemist was liable in an action on the case for unskilfulness and negligence in the manufacture of it; “Unquestionably, there was such a duty toward the purchaser and it extends in my judgment to the person for whose use the vendor knew the compound was purchased.” Pigott & Cleasby B.B. put their judgments on the same ground. I venture to think that Fry L.J. in Heaven v: Pender 12 Q.B.D. at p. 517 misinterprets Cleasby B.’s judgment in the reference to Langridge v. Levy 4 M. & W. 337. Cleasby B. appears to me to make it plain that in his opinion the duty to take reasonable care can be substituted for the duty which existed in Langridge v. Levy not to defraud. It is worth noticing that George v. Skivington was referred to by Cleasby B. himself sitting as a member of the Court of Exchequer Chamber in Francis v. Cockrell (L.R. 5 Q.B. at p. 515) and was recognised by him as based on an ordinary duty to take care. It was also affirmed by Lord Esher M.R. in Cunnington v. South Western Railway Co., 1883 49 L.T. 392, decided on July 2nd at a date between the argument and the judgment in Heaven v. Pender , though as in that case the Court negatived any breach of duty the expression of opinion is not authoritative. The existence of the duty contended for is also supported by Hawkins v. Greville (1896) 12 T.L.R. 532, where a dock labourer in the employ of the Dock Co. was injured by a defective sack which had been hired by the consignees from the defendant who knew the use to which it was to be put, and had been provided by the consignees for the use of the Dock Company, who had been employed by them to unload the ship on the Dock Company’s premises. The Divisional Court, Day and Lawrence J.J., held the defendant liable for negligence. Similarly in Elliott v. Hall (1885) 15 Q.B.D. 315 the defendants, colliery owners, consigned coal to the plaintiff’s employers, coal merchants, in a truck hired by the defendants from a wagon company. The plaintiff was injured in the course of unloading the coal by reason of the defective condition of the truck and was held by a Divisional Court, Grove and A. L. Smith J.J., entitled to recover on the ground of the defendant’s breach of duty to see that the truck was not in a dangerous condition. It is to be noticed that in neither case was the defective chattel in the defendant’s occupation, possession or control or on their premises, while in the latter case it was not even their property. It is sometimes said that the liability in these cases depends upon an invitation by the defendant to the plaintiff to use his chattel. I do not find the decisions expressed to be based upon this ground but rather upon the knowledge that the plaintiff in the course of the contemplated use of the chattel would use it: and the supposed invitation appears to me to be in many cases a fiction and merely a form of expressing the direct relation between supplier and user which gives rise to the duty to take care. A very recent case which has the authority of this House isChapman v. Sadler & Co. . , 1929 A.C. 584. In that case a firm of stevedores employed to unload a cargo of maize in bags provided the rope slings by which the cargo was raised to the ship’s deck by their own men using the ship’s tackle, and then transported to the dockside by the shore porters of whom the plaintiff was one. The porters relied on examination by the stevedores and had themselves no opportunity of examination In these circumstances this House reversing the decision of the First Division held that there was a duty owed by the stevedore company to the porters to see that the slings were fit for use and restored the judgment of the Lord Ordinary, Lord Morison, in favour of the pursuer. I find no trace of the doctrine of invitation in the opinions expressed in this House of which mine was one : the decision was based upon the fact that the direct relations established especially the circumstance that the injured porter had no opportunity of independent examination gave rise to a duty to be careful.
In Dixon v. Bell , 1816 5 M. & S. 198, the defendant had left a loaded gun at his lodgings and sent his servant, a mulatto girl aged about 13 or 14, for the gun, asking the landlord to remove the priming and give it her. The landlord did remove the priming and gave it to the girl, who later levelled it at the plaintiff’s small son, drew the trigger and injured the boy. The action was in case for negligently entrusting the young servant with the gun. The jury at the trial before Lord Ellenborough had returned a verdict for the plaintiff. A motion by Sir William Garrow, Attorney-General, for a new trial was dismissed by the Court. Lord Ellenborough and Bayley J.J., the former remarking that it was incumbent on the defendant, who by charging the gun had made it capable of doing mischief, to render it safe and innoxious.
It is worth noticing how guarded this dictum is. The case put is a machine such as a carriage not in its nature dangerous which might become dangerous by a latent defect entirely unknown. Then there is the saving although discoverable by “the exercise of ordinary care,” discoverable by whom is not said; it may include the person to whom the innocent machine is “lent or given”. Then the dictum is confined to machines “lent or given” (a later sentence makes it clear that a distinction is intended between these words and delivered to the purchaser under the contract of sale), and the manufacturer is introduced for the first time even by the person who manufactured it. I do not for a moment believe that Baron Parke had in his mind such a case as a loaf negligently mixed with poison by the baker which poisoned a purchaser’s family. He is in my opinion confining his remarks primarily to cases where a person is seeking to rely upon a duty of care which arises out of a contract with a third party; and has never even discussed the case of a manufacturer negligently causing an article to be dangerous and selling it in that condition whether with immediate or mediate effect upon the consumer. It is noteworthy that he only refers to “letting or giving” chattels, operations known to the law where the special relations thereby created have a particular bearing on the existence or non-existence of a duty to take care. Next in this chain of authority come George v. Skivington , 1869, L.R. 5, Ex. 1, and Heaven v. Pender , 1883, 11 Q.B.D. 503, which I have already discussed. The next case is Earl v. Lubbock , 1905, 1 K.B. 253. The plaintiff sued in the County Court for personal injuries due to the negligence of the defendant. The plaintiff was a driver in the employ of a firm who owned vans. The defendant, a master wheelwright, had contracted with the firm to keep their vans in good and substantial repair. The allegation of negligence was that the defendant’s servant had negligently failed to inspect and repair a defective wheel, and had negligently repaired the wheel. The learned County Court judge had held that the Defendant owed no duty to the Plaintiff, and the Divisional Court, Lord Alverstone, L.C.J., Wills and Kennedy, J.J., and the Court of Appeal agreed with him. The Master of the Rolls, Sir R. Henn Collins, said that the case was concluded by Winterbottom v. Wright , 10 M. & W. 109. In other words he must have treated the duty as alleged to arise only from a breach of contract; for as has been pointed , out that was the only allegation in Winterbottom v. Wright , negligence apart from contract being neither averred nor proved. It is true that he cites with approval the dicta of Lord Abinger in that case: but obviously I think his approval must be limited to those dicta so far as they related to the particular facts before the Court of Appeal: and to cases where as Lord Abinger says the law, permits a contract to be turned into a tort. Stirling, L.J., it is true said that to succeed the Plaintiff must bring his case within the proposition of the majority in Heaven v. Pender that any one who without due warning supplies to others for use an instrument which to his knowledge is in such a condition as to cause danger is liable for injury. I venture to think that the Lord Justice is mistakenly treating a proposition which applies one test of a duty as though it afforded the only criterion.
This with respect exactly sums up the position. The duty may exist independently of contract. Whether it exists or not depends upon the subject matter involved, but clearly in the class of things enumerated there is a special duty to take precautions. This is the very opposite of creating a special category in which alone the duty exists. I may add, though it obviously would make no “difference in the creation, of a duty, that the installation of an apparatus to be used for gas perhaps more closely resembles the manufacture of a gun than a dealing with a loaded gun. In both cases the actual work is innocuous: it is only when the gun is loaded or the apparatus charged with gas that the danger arises. My Lords, I do not think it necessary to consider the obligation of a person who entrusts to a carrier goods which are dangerous or which he ought to know are dangerous. As far as the direct obligation of the consignor to the carrier is concerned, it has been put upon an implied warranty ( Brass v. Maitland (1856) 6 E. & B. 470), but it is also a duty owed independently of contract, e.g. to the carrier’s servant (Farrant v. Barnes 11 C.B.N.S. 563). So far as the cases afford an analogy they seem to support the proposition now asserted. I need only mention to distinguish two cases in this House which are referred to in some of the cases which I have reviewed. Caledonian Railway Co. v. Warwick 1898 A.C. 216 in which the appellant company were held not liable for injuries caused by a defective brake on a coal wagon conveyed by the railway company to a point in the transit where their contract ended and where the wagons were taken over for haulage for the last part of the journey by a second railway company on which part the accident happened. It was held that the first railway company were under no duty to the injured workman to examine the wagon for defects at the end of their contractual haulage. There was ample opportunity for inspection by the second railway company. The relations were not proximate. In the second Cavalier v. Pope (1906 A.C. 428) the wife of the tenant of a house let unfurnished sought to recover from the landlord damages for personal injuries arising from the non-repair of the house on the ground that the landlord had contracted with her husband to repair the house. It was held that the wife was not a party to the contract: and that the well-known absence of any duty in respect of the letting an unfurnished house prevented her from relying on any cause of action for negligence.
In the most recent case Bottomley v. Bannister (1932) 101 L. J. K.B. 46 an action under Lord Campbell’s Act the deceased man the father of the plaintiff had taken an unfurnished house from the defendants who had installed a gas boiler with a special gas burner which if properly regulated required no flue. The deceased and his wife were killed by fumes from the apparatus. The case was determined on the ground that the apparatus was part of the realty and that the landlord did not know of the danger : but there is a discussion of the case on the supposition that it was a chattel. Greer L.J. at p. 54 states with truth that it is not easy to reconcile all the authorities: and that there is no authority binding on the Court of Appeal that a person selling an article which he did not know to be dangerous can be held liable to a person with whom he has made no contract by reason of the fact that reasonable inquiries might have enabled him to discover that the article was in fact dangerous. When the danger is in fact occasioned by his own lack of care then in cases of a proximate relationship this case will I trust supply the deficiency.
The declaration averred ( inter alia ) that the defendant “so improperly and negligently conducted himself” that the accident complained of happened.
I will only add to what has been already said by my noble and learned friend Lord Buckmaster with regard to the decisions and dicta relied upon by the appellant, and the other relevant reported cases that I am unable to explain how the cases of dangerous articles can have been treated as “exceptions” if the appellant’s contention is well founded. Upon the view which I take of the matter the reported cases, some directly, others impliedly, negative the existence as part of the Common Law of England of any principle affording support to the appellant’s claim, and therefore there is in my opinion no material from which it is legitimate for your Lordships’ House to deduce such a principle.
The action is based on negligence, and the only question in this appeal is whether, taking the Appellant’s averments pro veritate , they disclose a case relevant in law, so as to entitle her to have them remitted for proof. The Lord Ordinary allowed a proof, but, on a reclaiming note for the Respondent, the Second Division of the Court of Session recalled the Lord Ordinary’s interlocutor and dismissed the action, following their decision in the recent cases of Mullen v. Barr & Co. and McGowan v. Barr & Co. , 1929 S.C. 461.
The Appellant’s case is that the bottle was sealed with a metal cap, and was made of dark opaque glass, which not only excluded access to the contents before consumption if the contents were to retain their aerated condition, but also excluded the possibility of visual examination of the contents from outside; and that on the side of the bottle there was pasted a label containing the name and address of the Respondent, who was the manufacturer. She states that the shopkeeper, who supplied the ginger beer, opened it and poured some of its contents into a tumbler, which contained some ice cream, and that she drank some of the contents of the tumbler; that her friend then lifted the bottle and was pouring the remainder of the contents into the tumbler, when a snail, which had been, unknown to her, her friend, or the shopkeeper, in the bottle, and was in a state of decomposition, floated out of the bottle.
There can be no doubt, in my opinion, that equally in the law of Scotland and of England it lies upon the party claiming redress in such a case to show that there was some relation of duty between her and the defender which required the defender to exercise due and reasonable care for her safety. It is not at all necessary that there should be any direct contract between them, because the action is not based upon contract, but upon negligence; but it is necessary for the pursuer in such an action to show there was a duty owed to her by the defender, because a man cannot be charged with negligence if he has no obligation to exercise diligence —Kemp & Dougall v Darngavil Coal Co. , 1909 S.C. 1314, per Lord Kinnear at p. 1319; See also Clelland v. Robb , 1911 S.C. 253, per Lord President Dunedin and Lord Kinnear at p. 256. The question in each case is whether the pursuer has established, or, in the stage of the present appeal, has relevantly averred, such facts as involve the existence of such a relation of duty.
In my opinion the existence of a legal duty under such circumstances is in conformity with the principles of both the Law of Scotland and of the Law of England. The English cases demonstrate how impossible it is to finally catalogue, amid the ever varying types of human relationships, those relationships in which a duty to exercise care arises apart from contract, and each of these cases relates to its own set of circumstances, out of which it was claimed that the duty had arisen. In none of these cases were the circumstances identical with the present case as regards that which regard as the essential element in this case, viz., the manufacturer’s own action in bringing himself into direct relationship with the party injured. I have had the privilege of considering the discussion of these authorities by my noble and learned friend Lord Atkin in the judgment which he has just delivered, and I so entirely agree with it that I cannot usefully add anything to it.
An interesting illustration of similar circumstances is to be found in Gordon v. McHardy , (1903) 6 F. 210, in which the pursuer sought to recover damages from a retail grocer on account of the death of his son by ptomaine poisoning, caused by eating tinned salmon purchased from the defender. The pursuer averred that the tin, when sold, was dented, but he did not suggest that the grocer had cut through the metal and allowed air to get in, or had otherwise caused injury to the contents. The action was held irrelevant, the Lord Justice Clerk remarking, “I do not see how the defender could have examined the tin of salmon which he is alleged to have sold without destroying the very condition which the manufacturer had established in order to preserve the contents, the tin not being intended to be opened until immediately before use.” Apparently in that case the manufacturers’ label was off the tin when sold, and they had not been identified. I should be sorry to think that the meticulous care of the manufacturer to exclude interference or inspection by the grocer in that case should relieve the grocer of any responsibility to the consumer without any corresponding assumption of duty by the manufacturer.
My Lords, I am of opinion that the contention of the Appellant is sound and that she has relevantly averred a relationship of duty as between the Respondent and herself, as also that her averments of the Respondent’s neglect of that duty are relevant.
The cases of Mullen and McGowan which the learned Judges of the Second Division followed in the present case related to facts similar in every respect except that the foreign matter was a decomposed mouse. In these cases the same Court—Lord Hunter dissenting—held that the manufacturer owed no duty to the consumer. The view of the majority was that the English authorities excluded the existence of such a duty, but Lord Ormidale (at p. 471) would otherwise have been prepared to come to a contrary conclusion. Lord Hunter’s opinion seems to be in conformity with the view I have expressed above.
The incident which in its legal bearings your Lordships are called upon to consider in this appeal was in itself of a trivial character, though the consequences to the appellant, as she describes them, were serious enough. It appears from the appellant’s allegations that on an evening in August, 1928, she and a friend visited a cafe” in Paisley, where her friend ordered for her some ice cream and a bottle of ginger beer. These were supplied by the Shopkeeper, who opened the ginger beer bottle and poured some of the contents over the ice cream which was contained in a tumbler. The appellant drank part of the mixture and her friend then proceeded to pour the remaining contents of the bottle into the tumbler. As she was doing so a decomposed snail floated out with the ginger beer. In consequence of her having drunk part of the contaminated contents of the bottle the appellant alleges that she contracted a serious illness. The bottle is stated to (have been of dark opaque glass, so that the condition of the contents could not be ascertained by inspection, and to have been closed with a metal cap, while on the side was a label bearing the name of the respondent, who was the manufacturer of the ginger beer of which the shopkeeper was merely the retailer.
The allegations of negligence on which the appellant founds her action against the respondent may be shortly summarised. She says that the ginger beer was manufactured by the respondent for sale as an article of drink to members of the public, including herself; that the presence of a decomposing snail in ginger beer renders the ginger beer harmful and dangerous to those consuming it; and that it was the duty of the respondent to exercise his process of manufacture with sufficient care to prevent snails getting into or remaining in the bottles which he filled with ginger beer. The appellant attacks the respondent’s system of conducting his business, alleging that he kept his bottles in premises to which snails (had access and that he failed to have his bottles properly inspected for the presence of foreign matter before he filled them.
The respondent challenged the relevancy of the appellant’s averments and, taking them pro veritate , as for this purpose he was bound to do, pleaded that they disclosed no ground of legal liability on his part to the appellant.
The Lord Ordinary repelled the respondent’s plea to the relevancy and allowed the parties a proof of their averments, but on a reclaiming note their Lordships of the Second Division (Lord Hunter dissenting, or perhaps more accurately, protesting) dismissed the action and in doing so followed their decision in the previous cases of Mullen v. Barr & Co. and McGowan v. Barr & Co. , 1929 S.C. 461. The only difference in fact between those cases and the present case is that it was a mouse and not a snail which was found in the ginger beer. The present appeal is consequently in effect against the decision in these previous cases, which I now proceed to examine.
The two cases, being to all intents and purposes identical, were heard and decided together. In Mullen v. Barr & Co. the Sheriff-Substitute allowed a proof, but the Sheriff on appeal dismissed the action as irrelevant. InMcGowan v. Barr & Co. the Sheriff-Substitute allowed a proof and the Sheriff altered his interlocutor by allowing a proof before answer, that is to say, a proof under reservation of all objections to the relevancy of the action. On the cases coming before the Second Division on the appeals of the pursuer and the defenders respectively their Lordships ordered a proof before answer in each case arid the evidence was taken before Lord Hunter. It will be sufficient to refer to ullen’s case in which their Lordships gave their reasons for assoilzieing the defenders in both cases. The Lord Justice-Clerk held that negligence had not been proved and therefore did not pronounce upon the question of relevancy. Lord Ormidale held that there was no relevant case against the defenders, but would have been prepared if necessary to hold that in any case negligence had not been established by the evidence. Lord Hunter held that the case was relevant and that negligence had been proved. Lord Anderson held that the pursuer had no case in law against the defenders, but that if this view was erroneous, negligence had not been proved.
At your Lordships’ bar Counsel for both parties to the present appeal, accepting, as I do also, the view that there is no distinction between the law of Scotland and the law of England in the legal principles applicable to the case, confined their arguments to the English authorities. The appellant endeavoured to establish that according to the law of England the pleadings disclose a good cause of action; the respondent endeavoured to show that on the English decisions the appellant had stated no admissible case. I propose therefore to address myself at once to an examination of the relevant English precedents.
I observe in the first place that there is no decision of this House upon the point at issue, for I agree with Lord Hunter that such cases as Cavalier v. Pope  A.C. 428 and Cameron v. Young  A.C. 640 which decided that “a stranger to a lease cannot found upon a landlord’s failure to fulfil obligations undertaken by him under contract with his lessee” are in a different chapter of the law. Nor can it by any means be said that the cases present “an unbroken and consistent current” of authority for some flow one way and some the other.
I should doubt indeed if that is really a finding of negligence at all. The case on its facts is very far from the present one and if any principle of general application can be derived from it adverse to the appellant’s contention I should not be disposed to approve of such principle. I may add that in White v. Steadman  3 K.B., 340, at p. 348, I find that Lush, J., who was a party to the decision in Blacker v. Lake & Elliot t, expressed the view “that a person who has the means of knowledge and only does not know that the animal or ‘chattel which he supplies is dangerous because he does not take ordinary care to avail himself of his opportunity of knowledge is in precisely the same position as the person who knows”. As for Bates v. Batey & Co. , Ltd., cit. sup., where a ginger beer bottle burst owing to a defect in it which though unknown to the manufacturer of the ginger beer could have been discovered by him by the exercise of reasonable care, Horridge J., there held that the plaintiff, who bought the bottle of ginger beer from a retailer to whom the manufacturer had sold it and who was injured by its explosion, had no right of action against the manufacturer. The case does not advance matters for it really turns upon the fact that the manufacturer did not know that the bottle was defective and this in the view of Horridge J., as he read the authorities, was enough to absolve the manufacturer. I would observe that in a true case of negligence knowledge of the existence of the defect causing damage is not an essential element at all.
The prolonged discussion of English and American cases into which I have been led might well dispose your Lordships to think that I had forgotten that the present is a Scottish appeal which must be decided according to Scots law. But this discussion has been rendered inevitable by the course of the argument at your Lordships’ bar which, as I have said, proceeded on the footing that the law applicable to the case was the same in England and Scotland. Having regard to the inconclusive state of the authorities in the courts below and to the fact that the important question involved is now before your Lordships for the first time I think it desirable to consider the matter from the point of view of the principles applicable to this branch of law which are admittedly common to both English and Scottish jurisprudence.
The law takes no cognisance of carelessness in the abstract. It concerns itself with carelessness only where there is a duty to take care and where failure in that duty has caused damage. In such circumstances carelessness assumes the legal quality of negligence and entails the consequences in law of negligence. What then are the circumstances which give rise to this duty to take care ? In the daily contacts of social and business life human beings are thrown into or place themselves in an infinite variety of relationships with their fellows and the law can refer only to the standards of the reasonable man in order to determine whether any particular relationship gives rise to a duty to take care as between those who stand in that relationship to each other. The grounds of action may be as various and manifold as human errancy and the conception of legal responsibility may develop in adaptation to altering social conditions and standards. The criterion of judgment must adjust and adapt itself to the changing circumstances of life. The categories of negligence are never closed. The cardinal principle of liability is that the party complained of should owe to the party complaining a duty to take care and that the party complaining should be able to prove that he has suffered damage in consequence of a breach of that duty. Where there is room for diversity of view is in determining what circumstances will establish such a relationship between the parties as to give rise on the one side to a duty to take care and on the other side to a right to have care taken To descend from these generalities to the circumstances of the present case I do not think that any reasonable man or any twelve reasonable men would hesitate to hold that if the appellant establishes her allegations the respondent has exhibited carelessness in the conduct of his business. For a manufacturer of aerated water to store his empty bottles in a place where snails can get access to them and to fill his bottles without taking any adequate precautions by inspection or otherwise to ensure that they contain no deleterious foreign matter may reasonably be characterised as carelessness without applying too exacting a standard. But, as I have pointed out, it is not enough to prove the respondent to be careless in (his process of manufacture. The question is, does he owe a duty to take care, and to whom does he owe that duty? Now I have no hesitation in affirming that a person who for gain engages in the business of manufacturing articles of food and drink intended for consumption by members of the public in the form in which he issues them is under a duty to take care in the manufacture of these articles. That duty, in my opinion, he owes to those whom he intends to consume his products. He manufactures his commodities for human consumption; he intends and contemplates that they shall be consumed. By reason of that very fact he places himself in a relationship with all the potential consumers of his commodities and that relationship which he assumes and desires for this own ends imposes upon him a duty to take care to avoid injuring them. He owes them a duty not to convert by his own carelessness an article which he issues to them as wholesome and innocent into an article which is dangerous to life and health. It is sometimes said that liability can only arise where a reasonable man would have foreseen and could have avoided the consequences of his act or omission. In the present case the respondent, when he manufactured his ginger beer, had directly in contemplation that it would be consumed by members of the public; can it be said that he could not be expected as a reasonable man to foresee that if lie conducted (his process of manufacture carelessly he might injure those whom he expected and desired to consume his ginger beer? The possibility of injury so arising seems to me in no sense so remote as to excuse him from foreseeing it. Suppose that a baker through carelessness allows a large quantity of arsenic to be mixed with a batch of his bread, with the result that those who subsequently eat it are poisoned, could he be heard to say that he owed no duty to the consumers of his bread to take care that it was free from poison, and that, as ‘he did not know that any poison bad got into it, his only liability was for breach of warranty under his. contract of sale to those who actually bought the poisoned bread from him? Observe that I have said through carelessness and thus excluded the case of a pure accident such as may happen where every care is taken. I cannot believe, and I do not believe, that neither in the law of England nor in the law of Scotland is there redress for such a case. The state of facts I have figured might well give rise to a criminal charge and the civil consequence of such carelessness can scarcely be less wide than its criminal consequences. Yet the principle of the decision appealed from is that the manufacturer of food products intended by him for human consumption does not owe to the consumers whom he has in view any duty of care, not even the duty to take care that he does not poison them.
I read this passage rather as a note of warning that the standard of care exacted in human dealings with each other must not be pitched too high, than as giving any countenance to the view that negligence may be exhibited with impunity. It must always be a question of circumstances whether the carelessness amounts to negligence and whether the injury is not too remote from the carelessness. I can readily conceive that where a manufacturer has parted with his product and it has passed into other hands it may well be exposed to vicissitudes which may render it defective or noxious and for which the manufacturer could not in any view be held to be to blame. It may be a good general rule to regard responsibility as ceasing when control ceases. So also where between the manufacturer and the user there is interposed a party who has the means and opportunity of examining the manufacturer’s product before he re-issues it to the actual user. But where as in the present case the article of consumption is so prepared as to be intended to reach the consumer in the condition in which it leaves the manufacturer and the manufacturer takes steps to ensure this by sealing or otherwise closing the container, so that the contents cannot be tampered with, I regard his control as remaining effective until the article reaches the consumer and the container is opened by him. The intervention of any exterior agency is intended to be excluded and was in fact in the present case excluded. It is doubtful whether in such a case there is any redress against the retailer ( Gordon v. McHardy , 1903, 6 F. 210).

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