88 FOREST commissioner's report. 



ers, who were Ruel Williams, W. P. Fessenden, and Elijah L. 

 Hamlin. 



The legislature "Resolved, That the contract for the purchase 

 of all the lands belonging to the Commonwealth of Massachu- 

 setts situate in the State of Maine, entered into at Boston on 

 the twenty-third day of July, eighteen hundred and fifty-three, 

 by and between E. M. Wright, Jacob H. Loud, David Wilder, 

 Jr., commissioners, and Samuel Warner, Jr., land agent of the 

 Commonwealth of Massachusetts, in behalf of said Common- 

 wealth, and Reuel Williams, W. P. Fessenden, and Elijah L. 

 Hamlin, commissioners of Maine in behalf of said state, be and 

 same is hereby ratified and confirmed." The full text of this 

 resolve which will be found in Chapter So of the Acts and 

 Resolves of the special session of 1853 published in connection 

 with the Acts and Resolves of 1854, was approved, September 

 23. 1853. 



In his message to the legislature January 6, 1855, Gov. Anson 

 P. Morrill said : "The purchase of lands made by this State, 

 has added more than a million acres to our domain, for which 

 a large debt has been created, for the payment of which, in due 

 time, provision must be made. However, that purchase may be 

 ■considered, as a commercial transaction, involving the question 

 of immediate loss or gain, it was certainly very desirable to 

 divest Massachusetts of the title to those lands, even if it be 

 found desirable to sell them again, as fair prices can be had, 

 and the wants of the Treasury may demand." 



"By extinguishing her title, we dissolve connection with a 

 co-tenant who had interests not felt in common with ours, and 

 therefore would bear none of the burdens of building roads 

 and bridges in the territory owned in common ; and by the act 

 of Separation, Maine could tax no lands owned by Massachu- 

 setts, for any purpose whatever. It was an object then of con- 

 siderable importance to have the fee pass from that State, that 

 those lands might ultimately be held liable for taxation; for the 

 usual purposes for which other lands are assessed in the State." 



Lands Alienated. 

 The following table shows the quantity of land conveyed by 

 the State of Maine, annually, by legislative action with the 

 amount received, and aggregate average price, beginning A. D. 



