218 Report of the Board of Shell Fish Commissioners 



charts provided in this Act ; said report shall be completed and 

 filed in the office of the Board in the City of Annapolis, within 

 ninety days after the completion of the survey of any county. 

 Said Commissioners shall cause the same to be published in 

 pamphlet form, and transmit copies of the same to the Clerk of 

 the Circuit Court for their respective counties, where the charts 

 have been filed or directed to be filed, as hereinafter provided ; 

 the said report to be filed by the Clerks of the several counties 

 in a book kept for that purpose. And the said survey and re- 

 port, when filed, subject to the right of appeal hereafter pro- 

 vided for in this Act, shall be taken in all of the Courts of this 

 State as conclusive evidence of the boundaries and limits of all 

 natural oyster beds, bars and rocks, lying within the waters of 

 the county wherein such survey and report are filed, and shall 

 be construed to mean in all of the said Courts that there are no 

 natural oyster beds, bars or rocks lying within the waters of the 

 counties wherein such report and survey are filed, other than 

 those embraced in the survey authorized by this Act, and that 

 all areas of the Chesapeake Bay and its tributaries within the 

 State of Maryland, not shown in the survey to be natural oyster 

 beds, bars or rocks, shall be construed in all the Courts of the 

 State to be barren bottoms, and open for disposal by the State 

 for the purpose of private planting or propagation of oysters 

 thereon under the provisions of this Act; provided that the said 

 survey and report shall not be so construed as to affect in any 

 manner the holdings by citizens of this State in any lot which 

 may have been appropriated or taken up under the laws of this 

 State prior to the approval of this Act. 



SECTION 90. The said Board, in defining the natural beds 

 and bars, shall exercise its judgment liberally in favor of the 

 natural beds and bars, and allow a reasonable margin of the 

 barren bottoms, rather than encroach on a natural bed or bar. 

 The natural beds or bars shall be bounded by straight lines, 

 even though some portions of barren bottoms may thus be 

 necessarily included within such lines. 



SECTION 91. If residents of any county, exceeding twenty- 

 four in number, shall, within four months after the filing of said 

 survey and report in such county, file in the Circuit Court for 

 said county a petition, in writing, attested by the oath of some 



