numbered as follows; Commencing with number 1 in the northeast, thence progressively west to number 4 in the north west, and south to number 7 in the southwest corner of the section.

In numbering fractional lots, other than those above specified, wherever practicable and as a general rule, the series should commence with number 1 in the northeastern, or the most easterly fractional lot, and continue from east to west, and west to east, alternately, to the end of the series, as shown in diagram B; but such general rule is departed from under circumstances given as examples in said diagram.

Interior lots are to be, as nearly as possible, 20 chains long by 20 chains wide; and the excess or deficiency of measurement is always to be thrown on the lots bordering on the northern and western boundaries of the township, or those made fractional by meander lines.

The official township plat to be returned to the General Land Office is to show on its face, on the right-hand margin, the meanders of navigable streams, islands, and lakes. Such details are wanted in the adjustment of the surveying accounts, but may be omitted in the copy of the township plat to be furnished to the district land office by the surveyor-general. A suitable margin for binding is to be preserved on the left-hand side of each plat. Each plat is to be certified, with table annexed, according to the forms subjoined to "Diagram B," and is to show the areas of public land, of private surveys, and of water, with the aggregate area as shown on the diagram.

Each township is to be prepared in triplicate: one for the General Land Office, one for the United States district land office, and the third to be retained as the record in the office of the surveyor-general.

The plat for the local land office must not be forwarded until notice is received by the surveyor-general from the

Commissioner of the General Land Office that the survey represented on said plat has been approved.

The plats must be prepared as nearly as possible in accordance with the specimen plat designated as "Diagram B." The use of all fluids, except a preparation of India ink of good quality, must be avoided by the draughtsman in delineations relating to the public surveys. All lines, figures, etc., must be sharply defined. All lettering on the plats must be clear and sharp in outline and design, and ornamentation of any kind is prohibited. These requirements are necessary in order that everything shown upon original plats may be fairly reproduced in making photolithographic copies of the same.

All towns, settlements, permanent buildings, private claims, reservations, water-courses, ditches, lakes, islands, mountains, buttes, cañons, roads, railroads, telegraph lines, canals, etc., will be shown upon the plats and designated by-proper names where such are known.

The mean magnetic declinations determined at the date of the survey of the exterior and subdivisional lines will be entered upon each plat in the manner shown in diagram B. This will be ascertained by taking the mean of the greatest and least magnetic declination found at the dates of surveys, excluding such changes as are clearly attributable to local attraction.

All plats are to be drawn to a uniform scale of 40 chains to 1 inch, United States standard.

Surveyors-general will require that the specimen plat shall be closely followed in order that uniformity of appearance and expression of drawings representing the public land surveys may be attained.

The true field books, each bearing the written approval of the surveyor-general, are to be substantially bound into volumes of suitable size, and retained in the surveyor-general's office, and certified transcripts of such field books, to be of foolscap size, are to be prepared and forwarded, from time to time, to the General Land Office.

All transcripts of surveys must be written in a bold, legible hand, with durable black ink; and such transcripts of any series of surveys included in one account forwarded to the General Land Office, must be firmly fastened together at the surveyor-general's office prior to transmittal.

With the copy of each township plat furnished to a district land office, the surveyor-general is required by law to furnish descriptive notes as to the character and quality of the soil and timber found on and in the vicinity of each surveyed line, and giving a description of each corner.

Printed blank forms for such notes will be furnished by the General Land Office.

NOTE. The specimen plats, field notes, and diagrams are furnished by the government to all surveyors in its employ.

Any person desiring them, can procure the full "Manual of Instructions to Surveyors-General" by applying to the Commissioner of the General Land Office, Washington, D. C.

221. Resurvey in Northern Michigan.-Many of the first surveys in the northern part of Michigan were imperfect, and some of them fraudulent. In consequence, a second survey of 155 townships was made, under the following special instructions, issued from the Surveyor General's Office in Detroit, April, 1852:

"SIR: By your contract dated April -, 1852, you are required to resurvey the townships herein enumerated, in conformity with the following instructions, which are deemed necessary in addition to the printed manual of instructions to the deputies of this office, with which you are also furnished. This manual will be your guide in reference to the general subject of surveys,--and you are requested to notice particularly such portions thereof as have been specially marked or amended, as forming a part of your special instructions. To aid you in the preliminary examinations which will be necessary in each township before any resurveys are commenced, you are furnished with a copy of the original plats of the townships in your district, and other information, which enable you the better to understand the nature of your duties.

You are required to use every exertion in searching for the marks of the old surveys, and wherever the original lines and corners can be

found, if regularly established so as to be available in a correctional survey, they are to be respected, retraced, and reestablished by you, and so connected with the new surveys as to form a complete survey of each township.

The destruction of original landmarks is to be avoided as far as possible; but you are not to perpetuate fraudulent surveys,—that is, those which cannot be identified in the field:--where the marks which may be found for the lines are irregular and so inaccurate and inconsistent as to render their perpetuation an evil and their establishment a source of difficulty. Where such surveys exist, you will make regular resurveys without reference to the irregular work, taking care, however, to cut out and efface all the original marks upon the bearing trees, and all marks intended to perpetuate the survey.

The more effectually to cancel such original marks, you are required to indicate in your field notes and upon your diagrams the positions of all the old corners which may be destroyed by you, by giving the course and distance of such old corners from the corners of the new survey, and noting the intersection of the new lines with any marks of the old work.

The marks of your resurveys should be in all respects plain and intelligible, and the marks upon the bearing trees should indicate the resurvey as required in the general instructions, so as to avoid any difficulty hereafter in regard to its identity.

In townships where a portion of the original work only is found sufficiently accurate to be retraced and reestablished, the connection with the new surveys must be made by running closing lines straight from the regularly established corners in the new survey to the corresponding corners in the old survey, and if such lines are fractional in length, the excess or deficiency will be thrown into that portion of the line which closes upon the old corners, by setting the quarter-section posts at the distance of 40 chains from the corners in the new survey in the same manner as if the lines closed upon a boundary or correction line.

The true courses of these and all other lines run or retraced by you must be represented in your field notes, and as you will use the ordinary compass, the courses must be governed by the true variation of the needle, which you will of course ascertain before commencing the surveys in any township, and more frequently if necessary. All errors or defects in the exterior boundaries of the township should be ascertained and adjusted by you in such a manner as not to disturb other regularly established lines and corners.

A jog or crook in any line between two regular corners which may be the result of accident or of intentional fraud on the part of the deputy, may be corrected by making such line straight between the corners. The old crooked lines will be indicated in your field notes

and on your diagrams so that they may be represented upon the plats of your surveys.

It is known that in some cases where a portion of the original work may be found available in a correctional survey, the closing lines on the north and west boundaries of the townships are crooked and irregular, and so indistinctly marked as to render it difficult to detect them. At the same time, it is reported that regular corners for the closing lines are sometimes found upon the township lines at 20, 30, 40, or 60 links from the township corner, without regard to the lines for which they purport to be established. Such corners should be obliterated and such lines, which are doubtless random lines partially marked and not corrected, should be cancelled, and new lines supplied by running random and correcting straight lines back from the township corner to the corresponding section corner which you will have reestablished in the old survey. All such irregular lines and all corners which may be found established with no lines closing to them, if not in their proper places should in like manner be cancelled. Your field notes will be taken in the ordinary field book, the largest size of which will probably be large enough to contain all your proceedings in reference to any one township. These proceedings must all be faithfully recorded, and if they should be of such a nature as not properly to belong with the field notes, you will keep a book for the purpose, in which may be entered any remarks respecting your survey, which you will return with your field notes and other papers to this office. If it should be necessary to change the boundaries of any lands which may have been sold, it must be done only with the expressed written consent of the owner, duly attested, which will be taken by you, to be returned to this office with your field notes."

A copy of the foregoing instructions was furnished to each of the following deputy surveyors, to wit: William Burt, George H. Cannon, Addison P. Brewer, D. A. Pettibone, W. L. Coffinberry, Artemas Curtis, and Thomas Whelpley.