obtaining patents for vein or lode claims; but where said placer claim shall be upon surveyed lands, and conforms to legal subdivisions, no further survey or plat will be required, and all placer mining claims located after May 10, 1872, shall conform as nearly as practicable with the United States system of public-land surveys and the rectangular subdivisions of such surveys, and no such location shall include more than twenty acres for each individual claimant; but where placer claims cannot be conformed to legal subdivisions, survey and plat shall be made as on unsurveyed lands. But where such claims are located previous to the public surveys, and do not conform to legal subdivisions, survey, plat, and entry thereof may be made according to the boundaries thereof, provided the location is in all respects legal.

53. The proceedings for obtaining patents for veins or lodes having already been fully given, it will not be necessary to repeat them here, it being thought that careful attention thereto by applicants and the local officers will enable them to act understandingly in the matter and make such slight modifications in the notice, or otherwise, as may be necessary in view of the different nature of the two classes of claims, placer claims being fixed, however, at two dollars and fifty cents per acre, or fractional part of an acre.

54. By section 2330, authority is given for the subdivision of fortyacre legal subdivisions into ten-acre lots, which is intended for the greater convenience of miners in segregating their claims both from one another and from intervening agricultural lands.

55. It is held, therefore, that under a proper construction of the law these ten-acre lots in mining districts should be considered and dealt with, to all intents and purposes, as legal subdivisions, and that an applicant having a legal claim which conforms to one or more of these ten-acre lots, either adjoining or cornering, may make entry thereof, after the usual proceedings, without further survey or plat.

56. In cases of this kind, however, the notice given of the application must be very specific and accurate in description, and as the fortyacre tracts may be subdivided into ten-acre lots, either in the form of squares of ten by ten chains, or if parallelograms five by twenty chains, so long as the lines are parallel and at right angles with the lines of the public surveys, it will be necessary that the notice and application state specifically what ten-acre lots are sought to be patented, in addition to the other data required in the notice.

57. Where the ten-acre subdivision is in the form of a square, it may be described, for instance, as the "SE. of the SW. of NW. 1,” or, if in the form of a parallelogram as aforesaid, it may be described as the "W. of the W. of the SW. of the NW. (or the N. of the S. of the NE. 4 of the SE. 4) of section township -, range. as the case may be; but, in addition to this description of the land, the notice must give all the other data that is required in a mineral application, by which parties may be put on inquiry as to the premises sought to be patented. The proofs submitted with applications for claims of this kind must show clearly the character and the extent of the improvements upon the premises.

Inasmuch as the surveyor-general has no duty to perform in connection with the entry of a placer claim of legal subdivisions, the proof of

improvements must show their value to be not less than five hundred dollars and that they were made by the applicant for patent or his grantors. The annual expenditure to the amount of $100, required by section 2324, Revised Statutes, must be made upon placer claims as well as lode claims.

58. Applicants for patent to a placer claim, who are also in possession of a known vein or lode included therein, must state in their application that the placer includes such vein or lode. The published and posted notices must also include such statement. If veins or lodes lying within a placer location are owned by other parties, the fact should be distinctly stated in the application for patent, and in all the notices. But in all cases, whether the lode is claimed or excluded, it must be surveyed and marked upon the plat; the field-notes and plat giving the area of the lode claim or claims and the area of the placer separately. It should be remembered that an application which omits to include an application for a known vein or lode therein, must be construed as a conclusive declaration that the applicant has no right of possession to the vein or lode. Where there is no known lode or vein, the fact must appear by the affidavit of two or more witnesses.

59. By section 2330, it is declared that no location of a placer claim, made after July 9, 1870, shall exceed one hundred and sixty acres for any one person or association of persons, which location shall conform to the United States surveys.

60. Section 2331 provides that all placer mining claims located after May 10, 1872, shall conform as nearly as practicable with the United States systems of public surveys and the subdivisions of such surveys, and no such locations shall include more than twenty acres for each individual claimant.

61. The foregoing provisions of law are construed to mean that after the 9th day of July, 1870, no location of a placer claim can be made to exceed one hundred and sixty acres, whatever may be the number of locators associated together, or whatever the local regulations of the district may allow; and that from and after May 10, 1872, no location made by an individual can exceed twenty acres, and no location made by an association of individuals can exceed one hundred and sixty acres, which location of one hundred and sixty acres cannot be made by a less number than eight bona fide locators; and no local laws or mining regulations can restrict a placer location to less than twenty acres, although the locator is not compelled to take so much.

62. The regulations hereinbefore given as to the manner of marking locations on the ground, and placing the same on record, must be observed in the case of placer locations so far as the same are applicable, the law requiring, however, that where placer claims are upon surveyed public lands, the locations must hereafter be made to conform to legal subdivisions thereof as near as practicable.

63. The first care in recognizing an application for patent upon a placer claim must be exercised in determining the exact classification of the lands. To this end, the clearest evidence of which the case is capable should be presented.

(1) If the claim be all placer ground, that fact must be stated in the application and corroborated by accompanying proofs; if of mixed

placers and lodes, it should be so set out, with a description of all known lodes situated within the boundaries of the claim. A specific declaration, such as is required by section 2333, Revised Statutes, must be furnished as to each lode intended to be claimed. All other known lodes are, by the silence of the applicant, excluded by law from all claim by him, of whatsoever nature, possessory or otherwise.

(2) Section 2395, Revised Statutes (subdivision 7), requires the surveyor to "note in his field books the true situation of all mines, salt licks, salt springs, and mill seats which come to his knowledge;” also, "all watercourses over which the lines he runs may pass." It further requires him to "note the quality of the lands." These descriptive notes are required by subdivision 8 to be incorporated in the plat by the surveyor-general.

(3) If these duties have been performed, the public surveys will furnish a reasonable guide to the district officers, and to claimants in prosecuting their applications. But experience has shown that great neglect has resulted from inattention to the law in this respect, and the regular plats are of very little value in the matter. It will, therefore, be required in the future that deputy surveyors shall, at the expense of the parties, make full examination of all placer claims surveyed by them, and duly note the facts as specified in the law, stating the quality and composition of the soil, the kind and amount of timber and other vegetation, the locus and size of streams, and such other matters as may appear upon the surface of the claim. This examination should include the character and extent of all surface and underground workings, whether placer or lode, for mining purposes.

(4) In addition to these data, which the law requires to be shown in all cases, the deputy should report with reference to the proximity of centres of trade or residence; also of well known systems of lode deposit or of individual lodes. He should also report as to the use or adaptability of the claim for placer mining; whether water has been brought upon it in sufficient quantity to mine the same, or whether it can be procured for that purpose; and, finally, what works or expenditures have been made by the claimant or his grantors for the development of the claim, and their situation and location with respect to the same as applied for.

(5) This examination should be reported by the deputy under oath to the surveyor-general, and duly corroborated; and a copy of the same should be furnished with the application for patent to the claim, constituting a part thereof and included in the oath of the applicant.

(6) Applications awaiting entry, whether published or not, must be made to conform to these regulations, with respect to examination as to the character of the land. Entries already made will be suspended for such additional proofs as may be deemed necessary in each case.

MILL SITES.

64. Section 2337 provides that "where non-mineral land not contiguous to the vein or lode is used or occupied by the proprietor of such vein or lode for mining or milling purposes, such non-adjacent surface ground may be embraced and included in an application for a

patent for such vein or lode, and the same may be patented therewith, subject to the same preliminary requirements as to survey and notice. as are applicable to veins or lodes; but no location hereafter made of such non-adjacent land shall exceed five acres, and payment for the same must be made at the same rate as fixed by this chapter for the superficies of the lode. The owner of a quartz mill or reduction works, not owning a mine in connection therewith, may also receive a patent for his mill site as provided in this section."

65. To avail themselves of this provision of law, parties holding the possessory right to a vein or lode, and to a piece of non-mineral land not contiguous thereto, for mining or milling purposes, not exceeding the quantity allowed for such purpose by section 2337, United States Revised Statutes, or prior laws, under which the land was appropriated, the proprietors of such vein or lode may file in the proper land office their application for a patent, under oath, in manner already set forth herein, which application, together with the plat and field-notes, may include, embrace, and describe, in addition to the vein or lode, such non-contiguous mill site, and after due proceedings as to notice, etc., a patent will be issued conveying the same as one claim.

66. In making the survey in a case of this kind, the lode claim should be described in the plat and field-notes as "Sur. No. 37, A," and the mill site as "Sur. No. 37, B," or whatever may be its appropriate numerical designation; the course and distance from the corner of a mill site to a corner of the lode claim to be invariably given in such plat and field-notes, and a copy of the plat and notice of application for patent must be conspicuously posted upon the mill site as well as upon the vein or lode, for the statutory period of sixty days. In making the entry no separate receipt or certificate need be issued for the mill site, but the whole area of both lode and mill site will be embraced in one entry, the price being five dollars for each acre and fractional part of an acre embraced by such lode and mill-site claim.

67. In case the owner of a quartz mill or reduction works is not the owner or claimant of a vein or lode, the law permits him to make application therefor in the same manner prescribed herein for mining claims, and after due notice and proceedings, in the absence of a valid adverse filing, to enter and receive a patent for his mill site at said price per acre.

68. In every case there must be satisfactory proof that the land claimed as a mill site is not mineral in character, which proof may, where the matter is unquestioned, consist of the sworn statement of two or more persons capable from acquaintance with the land to testify understandingly.

POSSESSORY RIGHT.

69. With regard to the proofs necessary to establish the possessory right to a mining claim, section 2332 provides that "where such person or association, they and their grantors, have held and worked their claims for a period equal to the time prescribed by the statute of limitations for mining claims of the State or Territory where the

same may be situated, evidence of such possession and working of the claims for such period shall be sufficient to establish a right to a patent thereto under this chapter, in the absence of any adverse claim."

70. This provision of law will greatly lessen the burden of proof, more especially in the case of old claims located many years since, the records of which, in many cases, have been destroyed by fire or lost in other ways during the lapse of time, but concerning the possessory right to which all controversy or litigation has long been settled.

71. When an applicant desires to make his proof of possessory right in accordance with this provision of law, he will not be required to produce evidence of location, copies of conveyances, or abstracts of title, as in other cases, but will be required to furnish a duly certified copy of the statute of limitation of mining claims for the State or Territory, together with his sworn statement giving a clear and succinct narration of the facts as to the origin of his title, and likewise as to the continuation of his possession of the mining ground covered by his application; the area thereof; the nature and extent of the mining that has been done thereon; whether there has been any opposition to his possession, or litigation with regard to his claim, and, if so, when the same ceased; whether such cessation was caused by compromise or by judicial decree, and any additional facts within the claimant's knowledge having a direct bearing upon his possession and bona fides which he may desire to submit in support of his claim.

72. There should likewise be filed a certificate, under seal of the court having jurisdiction of mining cases within the judicial district embracing the claim, that no suit or action of any character whatever involving the right of possession to any portion of the claim applied for is pending, and that there has been no litigation before said court affecting the title to said claim or any part thereof for a period equal to the time fixed by the statute of limitations for mining claims in the State or Territory as aforesaid, other than that which has been finally decided in favor of the claimant.

73. The claimant should support his narrative of facts relative to his possession, occupancy, and improvements by corroborative testimony of any disinterested person or persons of credibility who may be cognizant of the facts in the case and are capable of testifying understandingly in the premises.

74. As a condition for the making of application for patent according to section 2325, there must be a preliminary showing of work or expenditure upon each location, either by showing the full amount suflicient to the maintenance of possession under section 2324 for the pending year; or, if there has been failure, it should be shown that work has been resumed so as to prevent relocation by adverse parties after abandonment.

The "pending year" means the calendar year in which application is made, and has no reference to a showing of work at date of the final entry.

75. This preliminary showing may, where the matter is unquestioned, consist of the affidavit of two or more witnesses familiar with the facts.