be measured; the original lines forming the boundary of the lands to be surveyed will be retraced, as already provided, and the marks upon the original corners will be appropriately modified as necessary; new quarter-section corners marked to control the subdivision of the new sections will be established on the original lines at midpoints between the closing section corners, or at 40 chains from one direction, according to the manner in which a new section is to be subdivided.

There are generally two or more ways in which a fragmentary subdivision may be executed, but a careful study of a sketch plat representing existing conditions will generally reveal the superiority of one method over another, and objectionable results should be avoided as far as existing conditions relating to the original surveys will permit.

MEANDERING.

226. All navigable bodies of water and other important rivers and lakes (as hereinafter described) are to be segregated from the public lands at mean high-water elevation. The traverse of the margin of a permanent natural body of water is termed a meander line.

The running of meander lines has always been authorized in the survey of public lands fronting on large streams and other bodies of water, but the mere fact that an irregular or sinuous line must be run, as in case of a reservation boundary, does not entitle it to be called a meander line except where it closely follows the bank of a stream or lake. The legal riparian rights connected with meander lines do not apply in case of other irregular lines, as the latter are strict boundaries.

Mean high-water mark has been defined in a State decision (47 Iowa, 370) in substance as follows: High-water mark in the Mississippi River is to be determined from the river bed; and that only is river bed which the river occupies long enough to wrest it from vegetation. In another case (14 Penn. St., 59) a bank is defined as the continuous margin where vegetation ceases, and the shore is the sandy space between it and low-water mark.

Numerous decisions in the United States Supreme Court and many of the State courts assert the principle that meander lines are not boundaries defining the area of ownership of tracts adjacent to waters. The general rule is well set forth (10 Iowa, 549) by saying that in a navigable stream, as the Des Moines River in Iowa,

high-water mark is the boundary line. When by action of the water the river bed changes, high-water mark changes and ownership of adjoining land progresses with it.

Meander lines will not be established at the segregation line between upland and swamp or overflowed land, but at the ordinary high-water mark of the actual margin of the river or lake on which such swamp or overflowed lands border.

227. Practically all inland bodies of water pass through an annual cycle of changes from mean low water to flood stages, between the extremes of which will be found mean high water. In regions of broken topography, especially where bodies of water are bounded by sharply sloping lands, the horizontal distance between the margins of the various water elevations is comparatively slight, and the surveyor will not experience much difficulty in determining the horizontal position of mean high-water level with approximate accuracy; but in level regions, or in any locality where the meanderable bodies of water are bordered by relatively flat lands, the horizontal distance between the successive levels is relatively great. The surveyor will find the most reliable indication of mean high-water elevation in the evidence made by the water's action at its various stages, which will generally be found well marked in the soil, and in timbered localities a very certain indication of the locus of the various important water levels will be found in the belting of the native forest species.

Mean high-water elevation will be found at the margin of the area occupied by the water for the greater portion of each average year; at this level a definite escarpment in the soil will generally be traceable, at the top of which is the true position for the surveyor to run the meander line. A pronounced escarpment, the result of the action of storm and flood waters, will often be found above the principal water level, and separated from the latter by the storm or flood beach; another less evident escarpment will often be found at the average low-water level, especially of lakes, the lower escarpment being separated from the principal escarpment by the normal beach or shore. While these questions properly belong to the realm of geology, they should not be overlooked in the survey of a meander line.

Where native forest trees are found in abundance bordering bodies of water, those trees showing evidence of having grown under favorable site conditions will be found accurately belted along

contour lines; thus a certain class of mixed varieties common to a particular region will be found only on the lands seldom if ever overflowed; another group of forest species will be found on the lands which are inundated only a small portion of the growing season each year, and indicate the area which should be included in the classification of the uplands; other varieties of native forest trees will be found only within the zone of swamp and overflowed lands. All timber growth normally ceases at the margin of permanent water. 228. At every point where either standard, township or section lines intersect the bank of a navigable stream, or any meanderable body of water, corners at such intersections will be established at the time of running these lines. Such monuments are called meander corners. In the survey of lands bordering on tide waters, meander corners may be temporarily set at the intersection of the surveyed lines with the margin of mean high tide, but no monument should be placed in a position exposed to the beating of waves and the action of ice in severe weather. In all such cases a witness corner on the line surveyed, at a secure point near the true point for the meander corner, will be established. The crossing distance between meander corners on the same line will be ascertained by triangulation or direct measurement, and the full particulars will be given in the field notes.

229. Inasmuch as it is not practicable in public-land surveys to meander in such a way as to follow and reproduce all the minute windings of the high-water line, the United States Supreme Court has given the principles governing the use and purpose of meandering shores in its decision in a noted case (R. R. Co. v. Schurmeir, 7 Wallace, 286-287) as follows:

"Meander lines are run in surveying fractional portions of the public lands bordering on navigable rivers, not as boundaries of the tract, but for the purpose of defining the sinuosities of the banks of the stream, and as the means of ascertaining the quantity of land in the fraction subject to sale, which is to be paid for by the purchaser. In preparing the official plat from the field notes, the meander line is represented as the border line of the stream, and shows to a demonstration that the water-course, and not the meander line as actually run on the land, is the boundary."

230. The surveyor will commence the meander line at one of the meander corners, follow the bank or shore line, and determine the true bearing and measure the exact length of each course, from