(after stating the facts as above). It was the duty of the defendant to exercise due care in maintaining its poles, wires, and appurtenances in a reasonably safe condition, having regard to the fact that the poles were placed along the country road where the public was accustomed to travel. Jones on Telegraph and Telephone Companies, § 190.

There, was evidence that some of the poles of the size of the one in question, in the ground in which it was placed, would rot off in 5 or 6 years. The pole that fell had been in the ground 15 years. It was ascertained after the accident that it was rotten and liable to fall when subjected to a strain. The pole once had a guy wire to hold it in place, but this wire had been cut and had not been replaced. There was some evidence tending to show that the person who cut the tree which fell against the wire and pulled the pole down was guilty of negligence; but this fact, if established, did not relieve the defendant from liability. The rule is:

In Johnson v. Northwestern Telephone Exch. Co., 48 Minn. 433 , 51 N: W. 225, the action was for an injury caused by the falling in a street in Minneapolis of one of the poles of the defendant on which were suspended its line wires, which fall was, as alleged, due to the rotten and unsound condition of the pole (permitted to be so by the defendant’s negligence), rendering it of insufficient strength to bear the weight of the wires suspended upon it. For the purpose of sustaining the pole and preventing it from falling, the defendant had extended a guy wire from the top of the pole to a building to which the other end of the wire was attached with the license of the owner of the building. The owner of the building revoked the license and required the removal of the wires from the building. The defendant failed to remove the wires, and thereupon the owner of the building cut them, and the pole, deprived of the stay afforded by the guy wires, broke off near the ground and fell into the street, injuring the plaintiff. At the close of the evidence the trial court directed a verdict for the defendant upon the apparent assumption that between the negligence of the defendant and the injury of the plaintiff there intervened an independent, adequate cause of the injury, to wit, the act of a third person, which it was said was what is termed in law the proximate cause of the injury. The Supreme Court held that it was a case of concurrent negligence, in which case each party guilty of negligence was liable for the result, and that the negligence of each as the proximate cause, for the injury would not have occurred but for that negligence.

The facts of that case are almost identical with the facts of the present case, and the law as there stated is applicable here. The evi *144 dence tended to show that the pole that fell was at that'time in a rotten and unsafe condition and without the support of a guy wire. The negligence of the defendant in maintaining the pole in that condition was-therefore concurrent with the negligence of the person who felled the tree upon the wire. The general principle that, where an injury is. the result of the concurring negligence of two or more persons, all are liable jointly or severally for the whole damage, is supported by abundant authority. Shearman & Redfield on Negligence, § 31; Bishop on Noncontract Raw, § 573; Marine Ins. Co. v. St. Louis, I. M. & S. R. Co. (C. C.) 41 Fed. 643 ; C., R. I. & P. Ry. Co. v. Sutton, 63 Fed. 394 , 11 C. C. A. 251 ; Gulf, C. & S. F. R. Co. v. McWhirter, 77 Tex. 356 , 14 S. W. 26 , 19 Am. St. Rep. 755 ; Carpenter v. Central Park, N. & E. R. R. Co., 11 Abb. Prac. (N. Y., N. S.) 416; Webster v. Hudson River R. Co., 38 N. Y. 260 ; Quill v. New York Cent. & H. R. R. Co. (Com. Pl.) 11 N. Y. Supp. 80 ; Ricker v. Freeman, 50 N. H. 420, 9 Am. Rep. 267 ; Louisville, N. A. & C. R. Co. v. Lucas, 119 Ind. 583 , 21 N. E. 968 , 6 L. R. A. 193; Lake v. Milliken, 62 Me. 240 , 16 Am. Rep. 456 ; Johnson v. Chicago, M. & St. P. Ry. Co., 31 Minn. 57 , 16 N. W. 488 ; Campbell v. City of Stillwater, 32 Minn. 308 , 20 N. W. 320 , 50 Am. Rep. 567 ; Flaherty v. Minneapolis & St. L. Ry. Co., 39 Minn. 328 , 40 N. W. 160 , 1 L. R. A. 680, 12 Am. St. Rep. 654 ; Eaton v. Boston & L. R. Co., 11 Allen (Mass.) 505, 87 Am. Dec. 730 ; Waller v. M., K. & T. Ry. Co., 59 Mo. App. 410 , 1 Mo. App. Rep’r, 56; Hooksett v. Amoskeag Mfg. Co., 44 N. H. 105; Barrett v. Railway Co., 45 N. Y. 628 ; Booth v. Railroad Co., 73 N. Y. 38 , 29 Am. Rep. 97 .

Whether the defendant was guilty of negligence in failing to maintain its poles in a safe condition under all the circumstances was a question of fact for the jury. The question of negligence must be submitted to the jury as one of fact, not only where there is room for differences of opinion between reasonable men as to the existence of the facts from which it is proposed to infer negligence, but also where there is room for such difference as to the inferences which might be drawn from conceded facts. Shearman & Redfield on Negligence, § 64.

It was also a question of fact for the jury to determine whether such negligence, if established, was the proximate cause of the injury. As stated by the -Supreme Court of the United States in Milwaukee, etc., Railway Co. v. Kellogg, 94 U. S. 469, 474 , 24 L. Ed. 256 :

The refusals of the court to give certain instructions requested by the defendant are assigned as error. It will not be necessary to review these requested instructions. They related to the degree of care required of the defendant, and the element of negligence entering into its liability in maintaining its line of poles. They instructed the jury that the defendant would not be negligent in assuming and acting on the assumption that no one would fell a tree upon its telephone line so as to break the line or pole; that the verdict should be for the defendant if the jury believed from the evidence that the pole which fell, although old and rotten, was so placed that it would not have fallen into the road and upon the plaintiff but for the tree falling upon the wires of the line. There were also requested instructions relating to the question of proximate and remote cause, and independent and intervening and controlling causes. It is manifest that some of these instructions were not proper and should not have been given. On the •other hand, it appears that the court gave such instructions as were proper in view of -the evidence in the case. Among other instructions, the court gave the following:

We think these instructions correctly defined the law applicable to the case.

We have carefully considered the exceptions to the testimony admitted by the court over defendant’s objections, and find no error to the prejudice of the defendant. Counsel for plaintiff in his argument to the jury, referring to the tree which fell upon the wires and which appears to have been cut down by one Sewall, said:

To this statement counsel for the defendant excepted, and requested the court to instruct the jury to disregard it. This the court did in its instruction, when it said:

Whatever error there was in counsel’s statement was manifestly cured by this instruction.

Finding no error in the record prejudicial to the defendant, the judgment of the court below is affirmed.