Odger's English Common Law

28 PRIVATE RIGHTS.
If cloth be delivered to a tailor to make a suit of clothes, he takes it
upon au implied contract, viz., to make the clothes in a workmanlike
manner and to deliver them to his customer when made. He is therefore
a bailee.
So is a pawnbroker who receives plate or jewels as a pledge or security
for the repayment of money lent thereon—the contract or trust being in
this case to keep the thing pledged with ordinary care and diligence, and
to restore it upon repayment of the money advanced upon it.
So, if a man takes in cattle to graze on his land, he is a bailee. This
particular kind of bailment is technically termed an agistment, and the
bailee takes the cattle in this case on an implied contract that he will look
after them with ordinary diligence—which means with that degree of
diligence which men in general would use in their own concerns. For
example, the agister of a horse, although he does not insure its safety, is
bound to take reasonable care of it and, if it be killed through his
negligence, is liable for its value. 1
There is another right over goods called a lien ; it often
arises out of a bailment. A lien is a right to retain pos-
session of goods and to refuse to deliver them up to the
owner till a debt due from him be paid. It is a right merely
to retain possession, not to use the goods. If the person who
had the lien gives up the goods, he has no right to retake
. possession of them ; should they afterwards lawfully come
again into his possession, his right of lien will revive.
A lien may arise in many different ways. First, there is a
vendor's lien. If one man sells goods- to, or manufactures
articles for, another, he is entitled to retain those goods or
articles, if he wishes, until the price be paid, unless he has
expressly or impliedly agreed to deliver them to the pur-
chaser before payment ; and this, although the property in
them may have passed to the purchaser when the contract
was made. But if the price of these goods be tendered to him,
he cannot retain them on the ground that other goods, which
he sold and delivered to the same purchaser on a previous
occasion, have not been paid for. Then there is the artificer's
lien. Any man who mends a coat or repairs a carriage is
entitled to keep that coat or carriage from its owner until
he is paid for his labour. So a miller has a lien on flour
Q ^Im T '
C°°k (1875) '
1 Q B D 79 aQd ' ' '
; S6e BaleHraR v- Gregory, [1895.] 1