surveys, by a line connecting a corner of the claim with the nearest public corner of the United States surveys, unless such claim be on unsurveyed lands at a distance of more than two miles from such public corner, in which låtter case it should be connected with a United States mineral monument. Such connecting line must not be more than two miles in length and should be measured on the ground direct between the points, or calculated from actually surveyed traverse lines if the nature of the country should not permit direct measurement. If a regularly established survey corner is within two miles of a claim situated on unsurveyed lands, the connection should be made with such corner in preference to a connection with a United States mineral monument. The connecting line must be surveyed by the deputy mineral surveyor at the time of his making the particular survey, and be made a part thereof.

46. Upon the approval of the survey of a mining claim made upon surveyed lands, the surveyor-general will prepare and transmit to the local land office and to this office a diagram tracing showing the portions of legal 40-acre subdivisions made fractional by reason of the mineral survey, designating each of such portions by the proper lot number, beginning with No. 1 in each section and giving the area of each lot.

47. The survey and plat of mineral claims, required by section 2325, Revised Statutes of the United States, to be filed in the proper land office, with application for patent, must be made subsequent to the recording of the location of the mine; and when the original location is made by survey of a United States deputy surveyor such location survey can not be substituted for that required by the statute, as above indicated.

48. The surveyor-general should derive his information upon which to base his certificate as to the value of labor expended or improvements made from his deputy who makes the actual survey and examination upon the premises, and such deputy should specify with particularity and full detail the character and extent of such improvements. 49. The following particulars should be observed in the survey of every mining claim:

(1) The exterior boundaries of the claim should be represented on the plat of survey and in the field notes.

(2) The intersection of the lines of the survey with the lines of conflicting prior surveys should be noted in the field-notes and represented upon the plat.

(3) Conflicts with unsurveyed claims, where the applicant for survey does not claim the area in conflict, should be shown by actual survey. (4) The total area of the claim embraced by the exterior boundaries should be stated, and also the area in conflict with each intersecting survey, substantially as follows:

Total area of claim.

Area in conflict with survey No. 302.

Area in conflict with survey No. 948

Area in conflict with Mountain Maid lode mining claim, unsurveyed.

Acres.

10.50

1.56

2.33

1.48

It does not follow that because mining surveys are required to exhibit all conflicts with prior surveys the areas of conflict are to be excluded. The field-notes and plat are made a part of the application for patent, and care should be taken that the description does not inadvertently exclude portions intended to be retained. It is better that the application for patent should state the portions to be excluded in express terms.

A survey executed as in the example given will enable the applicant for patent to exclude such conflicts as may seem desirable. For instance, the conflict with survey No. 302 and with the Mountain Maid lode claim might be excluded and that with survey No. 948 included.

50. The rights granted to locators under section 2322, Revised Statutes, are restricted to such locations on veins, lodes, or ledges as may be "situated on the public domain." In applications for lode claims where the survey conflicts with a prior valid lode claim or entry and the ground in conflict is excluded, the applicant not only has no right to the excluded ground, but he has no right to that portion of any vein or lode the top or apex of which lies within such excluded ground, unless his location was prior to May 10, 1872. His right to the lode claimed terminates where the lode, in its onward course or strike, intersects the exterior boundary of such excluded ground and passes within it.

51. The end line of his survey should not, therefore, be established beyond such intersection, unless it should be necessary so to do for the purpose of including ground held and claimed under a location which was made upon public land and valid at the time it was made. To include such ground (which may possibly embrace other lodes) the end line of the survey may be established within the conflicting survey, but the line must be so run as not to extend any farther into the conflicting survey than may be necessary to make such end line parallel to the other end line and at the same time embrace the ground so held and claimed. The useless practice in such cases of extending both the side lines of a survey into the conflicting survey and establishing an end line wholly within it, beyond a point necessary under the rule just stated, will be discontinued.

PLACER CLAIMS.

52. The proceedings to obtain patents for claims usually called placers, including all forms of deposit, excepting veins of quartz or other rock in place, are similar to the proceedings prescribed for 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 can not 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 forty-acre 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. 4 of the NW. 4 (or the N. of the S. of the NE. of the SE. 1) 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 connec tion 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 can not 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 herein before 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 water-courses 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 subdivion 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 centers 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 expendi tures have been made by the claimant or his grantors for the develop

ment 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 nonmineral 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 nonadjacent 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 nonadjacent 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 nonmineral 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 noncontiguous 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 a corner of the 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