Page:United States Statutes at Large Volume 3.djvu/162



same lands or any part thereof, whose claim has been confirmed by a board of commissioners for ascertaining and adjusting claims to land in said state or territory, nor preclude a judicial decision between private claimants in such interfering claims.

. And be it further enacted, That every person or persons claiming lands in the said state or territory, by right of donation under any former laws, whose claims are contained in the report of any of the boards of commissioners, or the report of the register and receiver of public moneys, or of the recorder of land titles, made or hereafter to be made under existing laws, and which claims shall appear by the said reports not to have been confirmed, merely because the tracts claimed were not inhabited on the twentieth of December, one thousand eight hundred and three, such person or persons shall be and they are hereby confirmed in their respective claims: Provided, That in every other respect such claims shall be embraced by the provisions, and conform to the limitations and restrictions, prescribed by former laws for granting the right of donation in the said state and territory.

. And be it further enacted, That it shall be the duty of the several registers of the land offices, and of the recorder of land titles in the state or territory aforesaid, with whom the claims in their respective districts have been entered, which are confirmed by this act, in all cases where the land has not been surveyed according to law, to make out, for the principal deputy surveyor of the district in which the land lies, an order of survey for each tract of land confirmed under this act, with a proper description of the tracts to be surveyed, wherein the quantity, locality, boundaries, and connexion, when practicable, with each other, and the tracts which have been heretofore confirmed, shall be states; and on the return of the plat of survey, or where an order of survey is not necessary, the said register or recorder of land titles shall, on application, for that purpose, make out for each claimant, entitled thereto by the provisions of this act, a certificate of confirmation, directed to the Commissioner of the General Land Office, and if [it] shall appear to the satisfaction of said commissioner, that such certificate shall have been fairly obtained according to the true intent and meaning of this act, then and in that case patents shall be granted in like manner as is provided by law for the other lands of the United States. And the said register or recorder shall be entitled to receive from the person applying therefor, where he shall have previously issued an order of survey, for such order of survey and certificate, the sum of one dollar and fifty cents, and for each certificate without an order of survey, the sum of one dollar.

. And be it further enacted, That it shall be the duty of the principal deputy surveyor, on receiving an order of survey from the register or recorder of land titles, and the surveying fees from the claimant, which shall not eceed three dollars for every mile to be surveyed and marked, to sruvey or cause to be surveyed, under the direction of the surveyor general, or surveyor of the lands south of the state of Tennessee, the several tracts of land confirmed by this act; and the said principal deputy surveyor shall make return of the surveys in separate plats to the register or recorder of the district within which the land lies, and also transmit to the surveyor general, or surveyor of the lands south of the state of Tennessee, as the case may be, a plat or plats of the surveys directed to be made by this section, who shall respectively transmit copies thereof to the commissioner of the General Land Office.

. And be it further enacted, That every person, and the legal representatives of every person, who has actually inhabited and cultivated a tract of land lying in that part of the state of Louisiana which composed the late territory of Orleans, or in the territory of Missouri, which tract is not rightfully claimed by any other person, and who shall not