Page:Hempstead's Reports.pdf/390

Rh   The 16th article requires the process verbal with a certified copy to be sent by the surveyor to the intendant; to the end that on the original process verbal, the necessary title paper, with the certified copy attached, be issued and delivered to the grantee. The original was required to be deposited in the office of the secretary and recorded, "to the end that at all times and against all accidents the documents which shall be wanted can be found."

The 17th article requires the titles of concessions to be recorded in books to be kept for that purpose.

The 18th article is as follows:—

""Experience proves that a great number of those who have asked for land think themselves the owners of it; those who have obtained the first decree by which the surveyor is ordered to measure it and put them in possession; others, after the survey has been made, have neglected to ask for the title to the property; we declare that any one of these who have obtained the said decrees, notwithstanding in virtue of them the survey has taken place, and that they have been put in possession, cannot be regarded as owners of land until their real titles are delivered completed with all the formalities before cited.""

The 25th and 38th articles show that the grantees were obliged to pay the surveyor for his services, and to have the surveys executed at their own expense; and the more particularly was this the case in gratuitous concessions. "The fees of the surveyor in every case comprehended in the present regulation, shall be proportionate to the labor and that which has been customary until this time to pay," is the language of the 30th article. 2 Land Laws, App. 208, et seq.

It is true that these regulations were promulgated after this particular concession was made; but it is obvious that they merely embodied general principles contained in antecedent royal orders, and regulations of previous governor-generals, and enunciated with greater particularity, rules, regulations, and usages then existing in the Province of Louisiana, and which had existed long anterior to the year 1797. This is not left to doubtful inference, for the intendant Morales expressly informs us that he prepared his regulations" after having examined with,