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No. 46. Lands included in Military Reservation are not subject to disposal under the mining laws.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE,

WASHINGTON, D. C., September 30, 1879.

S. R. DE LONG, Esq., Camp Bowie, Arizona.

SIR: In reply to your letter stating that in company with others you located a gold ledge in July, 1877, that the military reservation at Camp Bowie has since been enlarged so as to include the same, and asking what steps are necessary for you to take to keep your claim alive, you are advised that while the land is within a government reservation you can do nothing to sustain it. Should the reservation be removed and the land restored to public occupation, you should relocate your claim.

Very respectfully,

J. M. ARMSTRONG, Acting Commissioner.

No. 47. Repayment of purchase money.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, September 14, 1870.

Register and Receiver, Fairplay, Colorado Territory. GENTLEMEN: I have received your letter of the twentieth ultimo, inclosing one from Jas. Marshall Paul, Esq., attor ney for the South Park Gold Mining and Exploring Company, in which it is stated as follows: "Having become convinced that patents for the Honeycomb and De Mary lodes, Mosquito district, Park county, Colorado, are not desirable at present, we respectfully desire that the papers in the afore-mentioned cases be returned to us, and the same withdrawn, and the purchase money paid remitted to us."

In response to this, you are requested to inform these applicants that unless they decide to proceed in the cases referred to on the basis of our letter to you of seventeenth of June last, their claims will remain suspended, so far as action in this office is concerned, unless an adverse interest should be asserted. And with regard to repayment of the purchase money, you will inform them that there is no provision of law, or regulation of this office, by which the money paid for a mining claim may be refunded when a de

cision is made reducing the extent of a claim, except for so much of the superficies as is not included in the resurvey necessary to cause the claim to conform to the local laws and customs of the miners.

When a decision is rendered by which a claim erroneously entered is reduced in size, the purchase money will be returned to the extent necessary to make the payment meet the requirement of the law, to wit, five dollars per acre or fractional part of an acre, for the area actually embraced by the survey made, in accordance with such decision. Very respectfully,

Your obedient servant,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

No. 48. The law does not authorize the government to lease the public lands for mining purposes.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, December 8, 1870.

E. J. MAPES, Esq., Marquette, Mich.

SIR: In response to the subject of your inquiry in letter of the twenty-ninth ultimo, I have to state that there is no authority of law under which public lands may be leased by the government for mining purposes. * * *

Very respectfully, etc.,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

No. 49. The land department has no authority to pass upon the question of taxation of mining property by State authority."

*

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, December 11, 1868.

GEO. W. PROBASCO, Esq., Shingle Springs, California. SIR: In reply to your letter of October 16, 1868, requesting the opinion of the Commissioner as to the legality of assessing and taxing mining claims, by the State authorities, while the title still remains in the United States, I have to reply that the question submitted is one in reference to which this office has no duties to perform, and consequently has no authority to pass upon it in any shape.

Very respectfully,

Jos. S. WILSON, Commissioner.

*

I See Forbes v. Gracey, 4 Otto, 762.

No. 50. Definition of "rock in place."

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND Office, WASHINGTON, D. C., July 20, 1871.

Hon. THOMAS BOLES, Dardenelles, Arkansas.

SIR: In reply to your inquiry of the eleventh instant I have to state that the term "rock in place," as used in the mining acts of Congress, has always received the most liberal construction that the language will admit of, and every class of claims that, either according to scientific accuracy or popular usage, can be classed and applied for as a "vein or lode," may be patented under this law.

The plain object of the law is to dispose of the mineral lands of the United States for money value; and it is a matter of indifference to the Government whether the metal occurs in the form of a true or false vein.*

It may be observed as an important point that no proof is required to establish the vein formation of the deposit. The law requires the Surveyor-general to certify "to the character of the vein exposed;" but this is understood to mean that the certificate should show whether the vein exposed contains gold, silver, cinnabar, or copper.

Very respectfully,

WILLIS DRUMMOND, Commissioner.

* "The definition of a lode given by geologists is that of a fissure in the earth's crust filled with mineral matter, or more accurately as aggregations of mineral matter, containing ores in fissures." (Vau Cotta on Ore Deposits, Primes' Trans. 26.) The term lode or lead is of the same root as the verb "to lead" and as the word "lode" or guiding-star, being whatever the miner could follow and find ore. To the practical miner the fissure and walls are only of importance as boundaries within which he expects to find the ore. "A continuous body of mineralized rock lying within any other well-defined boundaries" would to the miner "equally constitute, in his eyes, a lode." (Eureka Cons. M. Co. v. Richmond M. Co., Field, Sawyer, and Hillyer, JJ., Ninth Cir. Ct.; 4 Saw. 311.) "Placers are superficial deposits which occupy the beds of ancient rivers or valleys." (Moxon v. Wilkinson, 2 Mont. 421.) The distinction between veins and placers stated. (Id.) A vein does not include a placer deposit. (Id.) "Vein or lode," applicable to any zone or belt of mineralized rock lying within boundaries separating it from the adjoining rock. (Eureka v. Richmond, 4 Saw. 302.) A broad metalliferous zone having within its limits true fissure veins plainly bounded can not be regarded as a single vein or lode, although such zone itself may have boundaries which can be traced. Distinguished from Eureka Mining Co. v. Collison, 5 Id. 439.

No. 51. Copper and cinnabar should be entered as "rock in place."
DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE,

WASHINGTON, D. C., August 26, 1871.

J. E. MORGAN, Esq., Clayton, Cal.

SIR: * * * As copper and cinnabar are found in "rock in place," rather than in the form of placers, it is held by this office that parties desiring to obtain patents for lands valuable on account of the deposits of cinnabar or copper, must enter the same under the act of July 26, 1866.

Very respectfully, your obedient servant,

WILLIS DRUMMOND, Commissioner.

CHAPTER XIV.

CIRCULAR INSTRUCTIONS.

No. 1. General circular of April 1, 1879, relating to lode, placer, tunnel,

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No. 3.

Circular of April 27, 1880, in regard to mineral withdrawals.

No. 4.

No. 5.

Notice by publication to be given before entry of land returned by the Surveyor-general as mineral. Circular of September 23, 1880. November 20, 1873, to Surveyors-general.

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No. 8.

No. 9.

September 24, 1879, to Surveyors-general, prohibiting United States deputy mineral surveyors from acting as attorneys.

In relation to publication of notices. Maximum charge.

No. 1.

DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR,

GENERAL LAND OFFICE, April 1, 1879.

GENTLEMEN: Your attention is invited to the Revised Statutes of the United States and the amendments thereto in regard to "Mining Laws and Mining Resources," title xxxii., chapter 6.

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MINERAL LANDS OPEN TO EXPLORATION, OCCUPATION, AND PUR

CHASE.

1. It will be perceived that by the foregoing provisions of law the mineral lands in the public domain, surveyed or unsurveyed, are open to exploration, occupation, and purchase by all citizens of the United States and all those who have declared their intention to become such.

STATUS OF LODE CLAIMS LOCATED PRIOR TO MAY 10, 1872. 2. By an examination of the several sections of the Revised Statutes it will be seen that the status of lode claims located previous to the tenth May, 1872, is not changed with regard to their extent along the lode or width of surface.

2. Mining rights acquired under such previous locations are, however, enlarged by said Revised Statutes in the following respect, viz.: The locators of all such previously taken veins or lodes, their heirs and assigns, so long as they

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