State ex rel. Grice v. County Commissioners

Grason, delivered the opinion of the Court. This action was brought by the children of Dr. Joseph P. Grice against the County Commissioners of Cecil County, to recover damages for the death of their father, who had fallen into Back Creek, in said county, and was drowned. The declaration alleges that “ one of the public roads in said county, to wit, the public road leading from Elkton to Bohemia Bridge, through the village of Chesapeake City, was negligently suffered, on or about the 6th day of August, in the year 1878, to be out of repair and unmended, so as not to be passable with safety, whereby Dr. Joseph P. Grice, the father of the equitable plaintiffs, in travellingon said public road, and using due care, was drowned.” There is a second count in the na-rr. of pretty much the same import as the first. ⁴²⁸ During the trial two exceptions were taken, the first to the refusal of the Circuit Court to permit the plaintiff to read in evidence to the jury the inquisition of the coroner’s jury; and the second to the ruling of the Court in refusing to allow to be put to Dr. Gilpin the question, “ "What would be the fair average estimate of the professional income of a good dentist, in a town of two thousand inhabitants, where he had no opposition ?” Eirst Exception.—It was admitted by the appellees at the trial below, that Dr. Grice was drowned at the time and place alleged in the narr., after he had passed over the temporary bridge at Back Creek, and therefore, the only purpose for which the inquisition could have been used, if introduced, would have been to prove that the appellees had failed to provide a suitable and safe crossing over Back Creek, while they were repairing the bridge over said creek at Chesapeake City. It is true that inquisitions post mortem, de lunático, and inquests of office by the