Page:Federal Reporter, 1st Series, Volume 9.djvu/751

 736 FEDERAL REPORTER. �of facts and legal conclusions on information and belief. The coin- plainant does not state who his grantor is, or who any one of the other locators of some 400 mining claims described as belonging to him is, nor when they, or any of them, were conveyed to him or his grantor, except that they were conveyed to his grantor before October 27, 1867, and to himself after that date. He mentions no date ex- cept the date of the act of congress of 1866, the date of the Mexican grant of 1846, and the patent October 27, 1867. No date of any of the deeds, act of incorporation, or other transactions since October 27, 1867, are given to enable the court to determine, from the facts, whether he ought to have discovered the frauds charged at an earlier date than alleged. For aught that appears, he may have received his conveyance from his grantor the day before he commenced his suit, or he may have received it as early as October 28, 1867. It is uot even distinctly averred that his immediate grantor was not fully informed of the acts of fraud, though it appears inferentially in arti- cle 22 as a reason for not applying for a patent. But there is no averment at all as to the knowledge of the other parties who must have located the numerous mining claims, and, for aught that ap- pears, might have conveyed to his grantor on the day before the issue of the patent, and with full knowledge of the frauds charged. �The great and substantial facts in the case are all facts of public record, and public proceedinga under the law, and of public notoriety. The survey and the patent are of record, and open to everybody's inspection and examination. The incorporation of the defendant is a matter of publie record. Notice of the survey appears from the allegations of the bill to have been published under the statute, and to have produced its proper reaults, as the bill shows upon its face that parties other than complainant's grantor actually appeared in the surveyor general's office as provided by statute, and filed therein objections to the survey on the very f undamental grounds of the fraud stated and relied on in this bill, and that the objections were over- ruled. Thus, not only the survey and patent, but the very facts charged as the equitable grounds for relief in this bill, were put on the public records of the surveyor general's office, and ruled upon by that office. The facts charged and the rulings, therefore, became public records prior to October 27, 1867, open to the inspection and examina- tion of all ; so, also, the fact, if it be a fact, that the grant was located in sueh a manner that it did not approach within 6 miles at the nearest point, or within 20 miles of some points, of the exterior bounds of the tract within which it could lawfully be located, and did ��� �