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half cents for every hundred words contained in each document thus recorded; nor shall any grant, deed, conveyance, or other written evidence of any claim to the said lands, derived, or pretended to be derived from the state of Georgia, and not recognized by the above mentioned articles of agreement, ever after be admitted or considered as evidence in any of the courts of the United States, unless it shall have been exhibited, and recorded, in the manner and within the time above mentioned; and provided also, that nothing herein contained, shall be construed to recognize or affect the claims of any person or persons, to any of the lands above mentioned; and provided also, that no certificate shall be granted for lands lying east of the Tombigby river, nor for lands situated without the boundary lines established by the treaty between the United States and the Choctaws, made the seventeenth day of October, in the year eighteen hundred and two.

. And be it further enacted, That the Secretary of State, the Secretary of the Treasury and the Attorney-General for the time being, be, and are hereby authorized and empowered to receive such propositions of compromise and settlement, as may be offered by the several companies, or persons claiming public lands in the territory of the United States, lying south of the state of Tennessee, and west of the state of Georgia; and report their opinion thereon to Congress at their next session.

. And be it further enacted, That a surveyor of the lands of the United States, south of the state of Tennessee, shall be appointed, whose duty it shall be to engage a sufficient number of skilful surveyors as his deputies, and to cause the lands above mentioned, to which the titles of the Indian tribes have been extinguished, to be surveyed and divided in the manner hereafter directed, and to do and perform all such other acts, in relation to the said lands, as the surveyor-general is authorized and directed to do in relation to the lands lying northwest of the river Ohio, and above the mouth of the river Kentucky.

. And be it further enacted, That the lands for which certificates of any description whatever, shall have been granted by the commissioners in pursuance of the provisions of this act, shall, as soon as may be, be surveyed under the direction of the surveyor of the lands of the United States above mentioned, in conformity to the true tenure and intent of such certificates; and the said surveyor shall also cause all other lands of the United States, in the Mississippi territory, to which the Indian title has been extinguished, to be surveyed as far as practicable, into townships, and subdivided into half sections, in the manner provided for the surveying of the lands of the United States, situate northwest of the river Ohio, and above the mouth of the Kentucky river, and shall transmit to the registers of the land-offices respectively, general and particular plots of all the lands surveyed as aforesaid, and shall also forward copies of the said plots to the Secretary of the Treasury; and he shall also, with the approbation of the said secretary, fix the compensation of the deputy surveyors, chain carriers, and axe men: Provided, that the whole expense of surveying and marking the lines shall not exceed four dollars for every mile that shall be actually run, surveyed and marked: And provided, that the expense of surveying those tracts of land, to which the title of the claimants if confirmed by the articles of agreement, or by the two first sections of this act, and those tracts claimed under British grants, a return of which is to be made to Congress, shall not be advanced by the United States, but shall be paid to the deputy surveyor by the parties claiming the same; and that in relation to all the land sold by the United States, the purchaser shall make the same payment for surveying expenses, which is directed by law to be made for lands sold north of the river Ohio.

. And be it further enacted, That all the lands aforesaid, not