be maintained against any, in
whose house or chamber any fire shall accidentally begin; for their
own loss is sufficient punishment for their own or their servants'
carelessness. But if such fire happens through negligence of any
servant (whose loss is commonly very little) such servant shall
forfeit 100_l_, to be distributed among the sufferers; and, in default
of payment, shall be committed to some workhouse and there kept to
hard labour for eighteen months[k]. A master is, lastly, chargeable if
any of his family layeth or casteth any thing out of his house into
the street or common highway, to the damage of any individual, or the
common nusance of his majesty's liege people[l]: for the master hath
the superintendance and charge of all his houshold. And this also
agrees with the civil law[m]; which holds, that the _pater familias_,
in this and similar cases, "_ob alterius culpam tenetur, sive servi,
sive liberi_."

[Footnote i: Noy's max. c. 44.]

[Footnote k: Upon a similar principle, by the law of the twelve tables
at Rome, a person by whose negligence any fire began was bound to pay
double to the sufferers; or if he was not able to pay, was to suffer a
corporal punishment.]

[Footnote l: Noy's max. c. 44.]

[Footnote m: _Ff._ 9. 3. 1. _Inst._ 4. 5. 1.]

WE may observe, that in all the cases here put, the master may be
frequently a loser by the trust reposed in his servant, but never can
be a gainer: he may frequently be answerable for his servant's
misbehaviour, but never can shelter himself from punishment by laying
the blame on his agent. The reason of this is still uniform and the
same; that the wrong done by the servant is looked upon in law as the
wrong of the master himself; and it is a standing maxim, that no man
shall be allowed to make any advantage of his own wrong.

CHAPTER THE FIFTEENTH.

OF HUSBAND AND WIFE.

THE second private relation of persons is that of marriage, which
includes the reciprocal duties of husband and wife; or, as most of our
elder law books call them, of _baron_ and _feme_. In the consideration
of which I shall in the first place enquire, how marriages may be
contracted or made; shall next point out the manner in which they may
be dissolved; and shall, lastly, take a view of the legal effects and
consequence of marriage.

I. OUR law considers marriage in no other light than as a civil
contract. The _holiness_ of the matrimonial state is left entirely to
the eccle