Government by the U. S. Attorney-General or his assistants. But the Statute of Limitations prescribes that such suits can only be brought within six years after date of issuing patent. Suits to annul a patent generally cannot be brought against an innocent purchaser. A patent issued through error or mistake in the law, or which is not authorized by law, is invalid and can be cancelled. Where the patent has been obtained by the wrong party through fraud, suit may be brought to hold him as the trustee of the patent until conveyed to the rightful owner. After patent has been issued by the Land Department, it has lost all jurisdiction over the land and cannot recall patent under any condition, even if the patent document has not been delivered to the claimant. What may be termed double patent can issue in certain cases, as patent for mining claims on original State or railroad sections, or on townsites, and known lodes patented on prior placer patents.

CHAPTER XVII

Lode Patent-Survey

No title, beyond that of possession, can be obtained to an unsurveyed tract of public land. No agricultural entry can be made until the land has been officially surveyed and platted into sections. Likewise, no patent can be asked for a mineral location, until an official survey of the location has been made and approved, with the exception of placer claims conforming to legal subdivisions and upon surveyed land. The surveyors-general of the different land districts, having charge of all official surveys of public lands, are empowered to appoint deputy mineral surveyors to make official surveys of mining claims for patent. The appointments can be secured by any one who has the necessary proficiency in the work, is of good character, and can give the required bond. Examinations are given for those who have not attended accredited schools. The instructions regarding the survey of mining claims are issued by the General Land Office under the title 'Manual of Instructions for the Survey of the Mineral Lands of the United States.' They form Appendix C of this work.

The applicant for a mineral survey should first select a deputy mineral surveyor of the land district, and arrange with him on the consideration for the survey. The surveyor's charges are paid by the applicant; the Government has nothing to do with them, beyond requiring that they be not excessive. The applicant should discuss with the surveyor, the 'Circular to Applicants for Mineral Surveys,' appearing as Appendix A of the 'Manual of Instruction for the Survey of the Mineral Lands of the United States,' and especially considering as to whether a preliminary survey should be made before obtaining an official order for survey. The applicant then, or after preliminary survey, if one be made, applies to the surveyor-general of the district for an

official order of survey, to be executed by the selected deputy. Application should contain name or names of the applicants in full, of each location, of the land and mining district, and of the deputy desired. Accompanying must be certified copies of the recorded original and any amended location notices of each location. The applicant must deposit with some assistant U. S. Treasurer or designated depository, to the credit of the U. S. Treasurer, a sum sufficient to cover the charges in the surveyorgeneral's office. Triplicate certificates of deposit are taken. The original is mailed to the Secretary of the Treasury at Washington, the duplicate is enclosed with the application to the surveyor-general, and the triplicate is retained by the applicant.

The charges in the different offices of the surveyors-general for checking and platting the survey vary, but are about as follows: For lode claims, singly or in groups, each, $30; for placer claim, $35; for millsite claim, $30; for millsite included with lode survey, $30; for each lode location included in placer survey, $30; for group of placer locations, first location, $35; for group of placer locations, all after first location, each, $30; for affidavit of $500 expenditure, filed after approval of survey, $5. Should an amended order for survey issue, an additional deposit will be required. By a recent Act of Congress, any excess in the amount of deposit, over and above the actual cost of work performed, or the whole of any unused deposit, will be returned.

The surveyor-general gives the application a number by which the survey is thereafter known, and issues an order for the survey to the designated deputy, enclosing copies of the location notices filed. The survey will have priority in being checked, platted, and approved in the surveyor-general's office, over all subsequent numbered surveys, unless it should be abandoned or the applicant and deputy should still continue to delay filing the survey notes after notice is given them to do so.

The next step is for the deputy mineral surveyor to go upon the claim with his instruments and assistants, and make the survey. He must personally take charge of the field work. In making the survey, which may be a single location or a group, for the contiguous claims of an applicant may be jointly surveyed under one application and number, each location must be surveyed

as a separate claim. The lines of the patent survey must be kept within the lines of the location as determined by its staking, not by the specifications of the location notice. The lines may be drawn in and within the location boundaries to accomplish any desired or necessary end, but they cannot be extended beyond. Surveyors do sometimes extend their lines and set patent corners outside the area of the location, representing or placing location corners where they were not. This is in defiance of strict orders of the Land Department, and when detected, invariably requires a corrected survey and all subsequent steps taken anew. If the deputy finds serious discrepancies between the location notice and the claims as staked, or in the case of a group poorly laid out, must leave many fractions that defeat the contiguity of the claims, he will report the circumstances to the surveyor-general, and an amended order for survey will be arranged for, to include certified copies of the amended location certificates filed after the lines are straightened out and corrected by a preliminary survey. The amended order for survey may perhaps be given a new number.

It is practically impossible to survey a group of claims for patent, unless they have at some time been surveyed in a preliminary way and the corners adjusted, which of course requires an amended location. The preliminary survey is often made just as a patent survey, and after order for survey is issued and a number assigned, the deputy returns and merely marks the posts. This is not in harmony with the Land Office regulations saying that the patent survey must be made by the mineral surveyor in person, after receipt of order, and without reference to any knowledge he may have previously acquired by reason of having made the location survey or otherwise. It may be asked, why should the requirement that the patent lines of each claim keep within the location, be so rigidly enforced? Because if it were not so enforced, patent lines would be thrown outside of the locations indiscriminately, and the locations of others encroached upon.

The deputy is required to identify the stakes or corners of the locations, or learn from reliable authority where they existed, and represent them upon his plat by bearing and distance from

the patent corner, if not identical. On the plat these location corners are indicated by the letters L. C. While the disappearance of the corner stakes of a location does not invalidate it, the applicant may save himself trouble by resurrecting them before patent survey is made. The survey should be made by traversing the claim, running all the boundaries. It is not necessary to run the theoretical lode or centre line, though the discovery post on it must be accurately set. Claims are often surveyed in opposition to Land Office rules by running the centre or lode lines and making offsets to the corners. A corner post or monument must be set at each corner or angle of the claim boundaries, and a discovery post on the centre or lode line at the point mentioned in the location certificate as the location or discovery point or stake.

The corners may be a rock approximating 24 inches in length, with a mound of stone alongside, a rock in place, or, and generally, a dressed post four inches square and three feet or more long. Iron pipes with brass caps similar to the bench-marks of the Geological Survey and the corners now being used in publicland surveys, are recommended by the Land Department. The corner nearest a public-land survey corner or mineral monument, is always taken as corner No. 1 of the claim. This corner should be marked on the side facing the claim with the initials of name of the claim, the claim corner number, and the survey number, as 'N.Y.-1-4750,' which means, corner No. 1 of patent survey No. 4750 of the New York claim. A few of any suitable trees within reasonable distaance should be blazed on a side facing the corner post as bearing trees, marked 'B.T.-N.Y.-1-4750,' and recorded in the survey notes. Large rocks in place may also be used for this purpose as bearing rocks, marked B.R., etc. Where the corner cannot be set at the proper point, a witness corner is placed on the line as near point as possible, and inscribed with the initials W.C., in addition to the other markings. The corners of each claim are numbered consecutively from 1 up, as above. The discovery post in this survey should be marked 'Dis.-N.Y,-4750.' If two or more claims corner in the same spot, the same post should be used, even if the claims are owned by different people. The initials, the corner number, and the