The Congressional prerequisites to locating a mining claim are:

First. The discovery of the vein or lode within the limits of the claim located. (U. S. Rev. Stat., Sec. 2320.) Second. The location must be distinctly marked on the ground so that its boundaries can be readily traced. Sec. 2324.)

(Id.

Third. Where a record of the claim is required, it shall contain the names of the locators, the date of the location and such a description of the claim or claims located by reference to some natural object or permanent monument as will identify the claim. (Id., Sec. 2324.) These are essential to a valid mining location. No local rule or regulation may alter, amend or dispense with them.

The Mining Code of Dakota prescribes the four certain things to be done to perfect a location:

First. By sinking a discovery shaft thereon, sufficient to show a well-defined mineral vein or lode.

Second. By posting at the point of discovery on the surface a plain sign or notice containing (1) the name of the lode, (2) the name of the locator, (3) the date of discovery, (4) the number of feet claimed in length on either side of the discovery, and (5) the number of feet in width on each side of the lode.

Third. Marking the boundaries of the claim.

Fourth. Marking and recording a location certificate containing the name of the lode, the name of the locator or locators, the date of the location, the number of feet in length claimed on each side of the discovery shaft, the number of feet in width claimed on each side of the vein or lode, the general course of the lode as near as may be, and such a description as shall identify the claim with reasonable certainty.

It will be observed that a "location notice is not the same as a "location certificate," under the local law. The former is required to contain the date of discovery, the latter the date of location. No provision is made for recording or amending the former, and no effect is given

to its failure to contain what the law prescribes. Ordinarily, the locator takes a copy of his location notice and records that as his location certificate. Courts are very liberal in construing location notices and certificates if the other requirements of the law have been observed in making the location. The "physical marks" constituting the boundaries were said to be sufficient notice to one honestly concerned to discover whether or not the land was appropriated for mining purposes. (Hess v. Winder, 30 Cal. 349.) This would hardly be considered the law now. In addition to the "physical marks" constituting the boundaries, a discovery of the vein or lode must be made. Sometimes the question as to what constitutes a discovery of the vein or lode, has arisen in the courts, and the tendency has been to give it a liberal construction.

In a recent decision by the Supreme Court of Montana (Glenn v. O'Donnell, 19 Pac. Rep.), it was held that the discovery shaft need not necessarily be on the vein, and that if the vein or lode is exposed in some other shaft on the claim, it is sufficient discovery.

In the Eureka Richmond case (4 Saw. 310, 311) Mr. Justice Field approved of the definition of a lode given by Dr. Raymond and adopted it. "The miners," said Dr. Raymond, "made the definition first. As used by miners, before being defined by any authority, the term lode simply meant that formation by which the miner could be led or guided. It is an alteration of the verb Lead; and whatever the miner could follow expecting to find ore was his lode; some formation within which he could find ore, and out of which he could not expect to find ore, was his lode."

In the same case, the Court said:

"Those acts (Acts of Congress, 1866 and 1872) were not drawn by geologists or for geologists; they were not framed in the interests of science, and consequently with scientific accuracy in the use of terms. They were framed for the protection of miners in the claims which they had located and developed, and should receive such construction as will carry out this purpose. The use of the terms veins and

lodes in connection with each other in the act of 1866 and their use with the term ledge in the act of 1872, would seem to indicate that it was the object of the legislator to avoid any limitation in the application of the acts, which a scientific definition of any one of the terms might impose.

"It is difficult to give any definition of the term as, understood and used in the acts of Congress, which will not be subject to criticism. A fissure in the earth's crust, an opening in its rocks and strata made by some force of nature, in which the mineral is deposited, would seem to be essential to the definition of a lode in the judgment of geologists. But to the practical miner the fissure and its walls are only of importance as indicating the boundaries. within which he may look for, and reasonably expect to find the ore he seeks. A continuous body of mineralized rock lying within any other well-defined boundaries on the earth's surface and under it, would equally constitute, in his eyes, a lode. We are of the opinion, therefore, that the term as used in the acts of Congress is applicable to any zone or belt of mineralized rock lying within boundaries clearly separating it from the neighboring rock. It includes, to use the language cited by counsel, all deposits of mineral matter formed through a mineralized belt coming from the same source, impressed with the same forms and appearing to have been created by the same pro

It may be said that every form of valuable mineral deposits, except placers, is a lode.

Owing to the greater friability of gold and silver lodes over the inclosing rocks, they crumble more readily from atmospheric causes than the adjoining country rock. The melting snows and falling rains carry the disintegrated pieces to a lower level on the surface, from the croppings of which they once formed part. When they are moved by the agencies mentioned, gravity forces them lower. A hill-side may be strewn with these indications of the existence of a vein or lode in the vicinity, and the croppings from which they have been separated may be covered by the soil. The

prospector with his keen eye will instantly dectect this float by its outward appearance, and if satisfied with its metallic character, will prospect for the lode. It may take weeks or months to find it. But while he is engaged honestly and diligently in searching for it, in the locality where he found the float, he will be entitled to the protection of the law from having his possession invaded until he has completed his discovery of the lode, for a certain definite period.

The Supreme Court of Utah held in the case of Harrington v. Chambers (3 Utah, 115)," whenever a prospector has discovered such indications of mineral that he is willing to spend his time and money in following, in the expectation of finding ore, a valid location of a mining claim may be made of a ledge deep in the ground and appearing at the surface in the shape of ore, but in vein matter only."

The Supreme Court of Montana in the case of Foote v. National M. Co. (2 Mont. 402) held that in order to have "a valid discovery the lode must be identified and one wall of it discovered."

The Supreme Court of Dakota in the case of the Golden Terra Mining Co. v. Smith et al. (2 Dakota, 403), opinion by Moody, J.:

"I am inclined to adopt and do adopt, the rule of the practical miner and prospector, that the vein is discovered when there is disclosed a well-defined body of rock in place carrying gold, which body subsequently proves to be continuous.'

The policy of the law is clearly stated by the United States Supreme Court in the case of Erhardt v. Boava, 113 U. S. 535, in which they say:

“In all legislation, whether of Congress or of the State or Territory, and by all mining regulations and rules, discovery and appropriation are recognized as the sources of title to mining claims, and development by working as the condition of continued ownership, until a patent is obtained. And whenever preliminary work is required to define and describe the claim located, the first discoverer must be protected in the possession of the claim until suffi

cient excavation and development can be made, so as to disclose whether a vein or deposit of such richness exists, as to justify work to extract the metal. Otherwise the whole purpose of allowing the free exploration of the public lands for the precious metals would in such cases be defeated, and force and violence in the struggle for possession instead of previous discovery would determine the rights of claimants."

LECTURE NO. VII.

MODE OF LOCATING PLACER AND LODE CLAIMS ON THE PUBLIC LANDS.

Necessarily, little remains to be said under this head. The public mineral lands of the United States, by the bounty of the Government, are free and open to exploration to citizens and those who have declared their intention to become such. So long as this license to explore remains unrevoked qualified persons may go upon the public mineral lands which have not been appropriated under the mining law by others, and if they discover valuable mineral deposits, locate the same. The extent of the placer claim locatable for one person may equal, but cannot exceed twenty acres; but one hundred and sixty acres of placer ground may be located in one tract by eight qualified locators. If the land is surveyed it must be taken up according to the legal subdivisions; if not the boundaries must be distinctly marked upon the ground so that they can be readily traced. This is done by marking the corners and sides of the claim with good, substantial posts, or mounds of earth or rocks or, where they exist, blazing trees, at proper distance from each other, and marking the stakes, mounds, or trees in such manner that other prospectors may have reasonable means of knowing what ground the previous one claims. It has been said that the