An innkeeper's lien appears to be one of those arising from the necessity which the law imposes upon certain persons, holding themselves out as public servants in their several callings, to receive and execute the orders of all who call upon them for their peculiar service. So far as they have accommodations, and payment is offered to them, these quasi public servants are under obligation to render the service demanded; and, as a consequence of this enforced duty, they are privileged with a hold upon the property of the debtor which comes into their hands during the service in which the debt is incurred, as security for the debt. Of a similar character is the service of a public carrier, and ot a farrier; and they also are protected by a lien upon the property upon which they exercise their respective callings.

*An innkeeper's lien extends to the detention of his guest's property for his own lodging and food, and of his horse for the price of provender and stabling.1 If he permit guest or horse to depart on credit, he loses his lien, and can never after assert it for that debt if the guest come again.

There is an obiter dictum of an English judge, that an innkeeper may detain his guest until payment is made; (y) but the doctrine has in later times been repudiated, and the question settled in the negative. (z) By the same authority it has been settled, that nothing upon the person of the guest can be detained by lien, (a)2 An innkeeper has no power of sale at common law over the goods which he detains for lien. This power exists by local custom as to certain guests, in some parts of England, and has been asserted to apply to the sale of a horse retained for the expense of his keeping, by innkeepers generally. But it has been authoritatively denied, both in this country and in England, (b) By common law, stablers who are not innkeepers have no lien upon the horses which they are employed to keep, (c)l The reason for this denial, as given in * the cases, is, that the use by the owner is inconsistent with the requirements of a lien. But if training be the principal motive in placing the horse with the stable-keeper, and the possession be continuous, the usual tradesman's lien will attach, (d) And the stabler has a lien upon a mare sent to his stable to be covered by a stallion, (e) 2

(y) Mr. Justice Eyre, in Newton 0. Trigg, 1 Show. R. 269.

(z) Sunbolf v. Alford, 3 Mees. ft W.

248; 1 Horn & Hurl. 13; and see Wolf v. Summer*, 4 Camp. 631. (a) See note (x), supra.

1 An innkeeper has a general lien upon all the goods and chattels of a guest, extending to horses, carriages, and harness, for the lodging, food, and entertainment of the guest. Mulliner v. Florence, 3 Q. B. D. 484. An innkeeper who receives a piano as part of the goods of a guest, whether bound to do so or not, which in fact belongs to a third person, has a lien upon it for the guest's board and lodging against the real owner. Threfall v. Borwick, L. R. 7 Q. B. 711; 10 Q. B. 210. "According to the advanced usages of society, the innkeeper might well be held to be bound to receive it, if he has room for it." Per Lord Coleridge, C. J. - K.

2 The innkeeper's lien extends to goods brought with a guest as his property and received as such in good faith, even though they belong to a third person. Threfall v. Boswick, L. R. 7 Q. B. 711, 10 Q. B. 210; Woodworth v. Morse, 18 La. An. 156; Cook v. Prentice, 13 Ore. 482.

If an innkeeper receives his guest as a boarder at an agreed price per week, the common-law lien of an innkeeper does not attach; but in such cases he would have the benefit of any statute lien provided in favor of boarding-house keepers, (ee)

(b) Chase v. Westmore, 5M.&S. 185; Fox v. McGregor, II Barb 41.

(c) Judson v. Etheridge, 1 Cr. & M. 743; Sanderson v. Belt, 2 Cr. & M. 304; Fox v. McGregor, 11 Barb. 41. The plaintiff was the owner of a horse, which, by some unexplained means, but without the knowledge or consent of the owner, came into the possession of the defendants, who were innkeepers. The horse was kept by the defendants for about eight weeks, when they caused him to be sold at auction, claiming to sell him "by virtue of an innkeeper's license." It did not appear that the owner of the horse had ever been a guest of the defendants, and all the account that the latter were able to give of their possession, was, that their hostler found the animal tied, in their stable, about eight weeks before the sale, and that he was regularly fed with hay and oats, up to the day of sale. The plaintiff sued in trover for the wrongful conversion of the horse by the sale at auction. The case was tried before a justice of the peace, who gave judgment or the plaintiff, for the value of the horse. The county court of Rensselaer county reversed this judgment, and, upon appeal to the Supreme Court, the latter judgment was reversed, and that of the justice affirmed. The Supreme Court held, that the defendants had. no right to sell the horse as a stray, without pursuing the course pointed out by the statute, which they had not done; that they could have no lien as livery-stable keepers, unless there was an express agreement for one; that they acquired no lien by virtue of their employment as innkeepers, unless the horse was delivered to them by a guest, and that even if it might be presumed, from the nature of their employment, that the horse belonged to one of their guests, still they would have no right to sell it in satisfaction of their lien; the remedy for the enforcement of the lien being by action in the nature of a bill in chancery. In any aspect of the case, the court held, that there was a wrongful conversion, and that the plaintiff was entitled to recover. Hickman v. Thomas, 16 Ala. 666; Miller v. Marston, 35 Me. 153, McDonald v. Bennett, 45 la. 456.

(d) Bevan v. Waters, 3 Car. & P. 520; M. & M. 236; Harris v. Woodruff, 124 Mass. 205; Towle v. Raymond, 58 N. H. 64.