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lowing the ledge in its downward progress far beyond the line bounding their surface ground, it is not by virtue of any grant emanating from this office, but under the authority conferred by the local mining regulations; and if their rights in that respect are such that Williams & Co. cannot restrain them now, when they are without patent, it is not easy to perceive what injury they will receive from the issuing of the patent, as that document will not confer any greater rights as to the manner of working the mine than are already possessed under the local rules and customs of miners.

No controversy exists in respect to the number of feet claimed on the lode, one company claiming 2,000 feet and the other 1,000, and both agree as to the partition post dividing one claim from the other. Nor is there any real conflict as to the surface ground, both claimants adopting the same identical line as a boundary between them in the diagrams filed with their respective applications for patents, one designating its bearing as N. 19 W.; the other as N. 2510 W., but both marking its termini by the same identical posts.

It is in fact as Williams & Co. represent it, an "underground" conflict, and one that cannot be corrected by a modification of the lines on the surface. Evidently such a conflict cannot be adjudicated in court under the sixth section of the mining act, for the controversy there contemplated, is one in which the judicial decision would control the General Land Office in its subsequent action on the application for patent, and would lead to a modification of the grant one way or the other, so as to conform it to the decision of the court. But no such result could follow from the action of the court upon the question raised by Williams & Co., because whatever might be determined there, the patent issued from this office would still grant "the right to follow the vein or lode with its dips, angles and variations, to any depth, although it may enter the land adjoining, the mining act authorizing the grant to be made in this form, and no decision of a legal tribunal can nullify this statutory requirement. Most assuredly a decision producing no change in the description of the premises, or the parties, can in no way control the grant contained in a patent, for all its other formal parts are statutory and beyond the power of the courts.

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An applicant for a patent under the mining act may include surface ground lying on either or both sides of the vein, as part of his claim, or he may apply for a patent for the vein alone. His rights upon the vein and in working into it are precisely the same, whatever may be the form of his surface ground, or whether he has any or none.

His

end lines and the distance between them will be the same at all depths as upon the surface, no matter whether the position of the vein is vertical, or whether it dips at a less or greater angle. This results directly from the right granted to the miner by all the local mining customs, as well as by the national mining act, of following_the vein with all its dips, angles, and variations; and the Pittsburg Company and Williams & Co. alike possess this privilege by the mining regulations of Nevada County, California.

The Congressional enactment adopts in this respect the provisions of the mining customs, subordinating the rights of a patentee in respect to the surface ground, to the more important rights in respect to the vein, granting the right to follow the latter with all its dips, angles, and variations, to any depth, although it may enter the land adjoining, and requiring the adjoining land to be sold subject to this condition.

If the vein occupied by these companies descended vertically into the earth, no controversy would arise between them, it is presumed, in respect to the descending boundary. between their claims. The line would be a perpendicular, and at a depth of 1000 feet the claimants would still measure from such perpendicular 1000 feet in one direction and 2000 in the other, as the extent of their respective claims, at the bottom of the cavity made by extracting the ore. If, then, we suppose such cavity to have been already made, and that, by a convulsion of nature, the vein should be swung from a vertical position to that of an angle at which it now dips, the cavity would then, in its last position, represent such a one as these contestants are now authorized to make, by extracting the ore from their respective portions to that depth, and the lines of such cavity would represent the lines they are now entitled to follow, either under the mining customs or the act of Congress.

If either party is guilty of trespass on the rights of the other, the courts are open to them for redress, either before or after the issuing of a patent, and such rights are neither abridged nor enlarged by the patent.

The Pittsburg Company's application, having been so long suspended, on account of the filing of an opposing claim having in fact none of the incidents of an adverse claim, under the sixth section of the mining act, will be carried into patent without further delay.

You will notify both parties of this decision.
Very respectfully,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

Proceedings when Duplicate Receiver's Receipt is Lost.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, April 18, 1870.

Register and Receiver, Central City, Colorado:

GENTLEMEN: I have to acknowledge the receipt of your letter of the seventh instant, in which you state that you have received a letter from G. F. Sadd, Esq., secretary of the Cascade Silver Mining Company, to the effect that duplicate receipt for Mineral Entry No. 11, Cascade lode, has been lost, and after careful and diligent search cannot be found, and desiring to be informed how he can obtain the patent.

In reply, I would state that the patent may be transmitted to Mr. Sadd, upon a compliance with the following conditions, viz.:

1st. That he furnish you with satisfactory proof, under the corporate seal of the company, that he is the duly elected Secretary thereof, and authorized to receive the patent for their claim; and

2d. His affidavit setting forth that he was in possession of said duplicate receipt, No. 11, for the Cascade lode; that the same has been lost; and that, up to the present time, after careful and diligent search, he is unable to find it.

This affidavit must be taken before an officer duly qualified to administer oaths, and attested by his seal; and upon filing the same, with the evidence before recited, the patent may be sent to him, requesting an acknowledgment of its receipt.

Very respectfully,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

Sections Sixteen and Thirty-six, when Mineral in Character, do not pass to the State of Nevada.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, May 24, 1870. Register and Receiver U. S. Land Office, Carson City, Nevada: GENTLEMEN: In response to the Register's letter of 23d ultimo, inquiring as to the right of the State of Nevada to Sections Nos. Sixteen and Thirty-six as school lands, when the same are known to contain valuable minerals, I have to state that the question was submitted to the Secretary of the Interior with the views of this office thereon; the concurring opinion of the head of the department on the subject, being shown in the inclosed copy of his letter,

dated the twentieth instant, and you will be governed accordingly.

The State Register will be allowed to select other lands as indemnity, when School Sections Nos. Sixteen and Thirtysix are found to be mineral, and you will so inform him, furnishing him a copy of the inclosed decision, the receipt of which you are requested to acknowledge.

Very respectfully,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

[INCLOSURE.]

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

WASHINGTON, D. C., May 20, 1870.

SIR: I have received your letter of the 10th instant, in relation to the right of the State of Nevada to Sections Sixteen and Thirty-six of each township, for school purposes, when such sections are found to contain mines.

The seventh section of the enabling act of 21st March, 1864, passed at the first session of the 38th Congress, grants to said State said sections, unless sold or otherwise disposed of by any act of Congress.

Joint resolution of the 30th January, 1865, (13 Stat. 567,) declares: "That no act passed at the first session of the 38th Congress, granting lands to States or corporations, to aid in the construction of roads, or for other purposes, or to extend the time of grants heretofore made, shall be so construed as to embrace mineral lands, which in all cases shall be, and are, reserved exclusively to the United States, unless otherwise specially provided in the act, or acts, making the grant.

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This joint resolution prescribes a rule of construction which, applied to the act, would exclude from its operation mineral lands. Such lands are reserved exclusively to the United States unless "otherwise specially provided” in the act making the grant.

In view of this legislation, and of the considerations set forth in your letter, it seems to be clear that an executive officer must regard a section of land, No. 16 or 36 situate in Nevada, and "rich in minerals," as the property of the United States, and not as passing to the State under the act and should deal with it accordingly.

Very respectfully,

HON. JOSEPH S. WILSON,

Your obedient servant,

J. D. Cox, Secretary.

Commissioner of the General Land Office.

Purchase Money is Refunded Only when a Mistake has

occurred.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, September 14, 1870.

Register and Receiver, Fairplay, Colorado:

GENTLEMEN: I have received your letter of 20th ultimo, including one from Jas. Marshall Paul, Esq., attorney for the South Park Gold Mining and Exploring Company, in which it is stated as follows: "Having become convinced that patents for the Honeycomb and DeMary lodes, Mosquito district, Park Co., Colorado, are not desirable at present, we respectfully desire that the papers in the aforementioned cases be returned to us, and the same withdrawn and the purchase money paid remitted to us."

In response to this, you are requested to inform these applicants, that unless they decide to proceed in the cases referred to on the basis of our letter to you of seventeenth June last, their claims will remain suspended, so far as action in this office is concerned (unless an adverse interest should be asserted). And with regard to repayment of the purchase money, you will inform them that there is no provision of law, or regulation of this office, by which the money paid for a mining claim may be refunded, when a decision is made reducing the extent of a claim, except for so much of the superficies as is not included in the reserves necessary to cause the claim to conform to the local laws and customs of the miners.

When a decision is rendered, by which a claim erroneously entered is reduced in size, the purchase money will be returned, to the extent necessary to make the payment meet the requirement of the law, to wit: five dollars per acre or fractional part of an acre, for the area actually embraced by the survey made, in accordance with such decision.

Very respectfully, etc.,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

Number of Feet on a Lode that may be located and purchased in New Mexico.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, September 22, 1870. Register and Receiver U. S. Land Office, Santa Fe, New Mexico:

GENTLEMEN: This office has examined the papers forwarded with the Register's letter of thirtieth July last, in the case of the San Augustin Mining Company's applica

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