Page:Notes on the State of Virginia (1802).djvu/202

188 crown, thereafter, made general purchaſes of the Indians from time to time, and the governor parcelled them out by ſpecial grants, conformed to the rules before deſcribed, which it was not in his power, or in that of the crown, to diſpenſe with. Grants, unaccompanied by their proper legal circumſtances, were ſet aſide, regularly ſcire facias, or by bill in chancery. Since the eſtabliſhment of our new government, this order of things is but little changed. An individual, wiſhing to appropriate to himſelf lands ſtill unappropriated by any other, pays to the public treaſurer a ſum of money proportioned to the quantity he wants. He carries the treaſurer's receipt to the auditors of public accounts, who thereupon debit the treaſurer with the ſum, and order the regiſter of the land-office to give the party a warrant for his land. With this warrant from the regiſter, he goes to the ſurveyor of the county where the land lies on which he has caſt his eye. The ſurveyor lays it off for him, gives him its exact deſcription, in the form of a cirtificate, which c i rtificate he returns to the land office, where a grant is made out, and is ſigned by the governor. This veſts in him a perfect dominion in his lands, tranſmiſſable to whom he pleaſes by deed or will, or by deſcent to his heirs if he die inteſtate.

Many of the laws which were in force during the monarchy being relative merely to that form of government, or inculcating principles inconſiſtent with republicaniſm, the firſt aſſembly which met after the eſtabliſhment of the commonwealth appointed a committee to reviſe the whole code, to reduce it into proper form and volume, and report it to the aſſembly. This work has been