[a. OF. baillement, f. bailler to bail, give, deliver.]
1. Delivery, handing over, or giving for a specific purpose; according to Blackstone, delivery in trust, upon a contract expressed or implied, that the trust shall be faithfully executed on the part of the bailee.
1602. Fulbecke, 1st Pt. Parall., Introd. viij. To treat of borrowing and lending, and of the bailement or deliuery of goods and chattels.
1624. Termes de la Ley, 39. Bailement is a diliuerie of things … to another, sometimes to be deliuered backe to the bailor … sometimes to the vse of the Bailee.
1768. Blackstone, Comm., II. 452.
1809. R. Langford, Introd. Trade, 129. Bailment, goods delivered in trust for the fulfilment of an agreement.
1875. Poste, Gaius, III. 423. Deposit, loan for use, pawn or pledge, letting and hiring, and mandate, are grouped together in English law under the head of Bailments.
2. The action of bailing a prisoner or person accused. Also the record of the same.
1554. Act 1 & 2 Mary, xiii. § 3. (An Act touching Bailment of Persons) … At the Time of the said Bailment or Mainprise.
1581. Lambarde, Eiren., III. i. (1588), 338. The booke of the Norman Customes calleth Bailement a live prison.
1619. Dalton, Countr. Just., cxiv. Bailment … is the saving or delivery of a man out of prison, before that he hath satisfied the law.
1628. King’s Letter, in Rushw. (1659), I. 569. Our Judges shall proceed to the Deliverance or Bailment of the Prisoner.
1772. Junius Lett., lxviii. 340. The business touching bailment of prisoners.
1826. Act Geo. IV., lxiv. § 3. [The magistrate is to] subscribe all examinations, informations, bailments, and recognizances.
1876. Fox Bourne, Locke, I. i. 5, note.
