168 LANDS OF THE ARID REGION OF THE UNITED STATES. 
price, but in case said lands or the proceeds thereof were applied to any 
purposes other than that for which they were granted, the grant was to 
become null and void. 
In this grant we find the first provisions for indemnity if the grant was 
not full by reason of prior sales or disposals by the Government. There, 
if the lands were not to be found ‘in place”, selections “in lieu” could be 
made from another county. 
Grants like the one just referred to were made from time to time, 
differing but little in their character and extent. 
By an act approved March 2, 1833, the State of Illinois was authorized 
to apply the lands granted by the act of March 2, 1827, for canal 
purposes, to the construction of a railroad instead; and the same restrictive 
impositions were continued. 
This is the first act looking to the construction of a railroad through 
the assistance of land donations. = 
The railroad system was then but in its infancy, and the few miles 
built had been constructed by private means. 
It is proper to add, however, that the State did not avail itself of the 
privilege granted, for it subsequently built a canal. 
An act approved March 3, 1835, granted, for the purpose of aiding 
in the construction of a railroad by a corporation organized in Florida, 
the right of way through the public lands over which it might pass, 
thirty feet of land on each side of its line, and the right to take and use 
the timber for “one hundred yards” on each side for the construction 
and repair of said road; it was also granted ‘ten acres of land at the junc- 
tion of the St. Mark’s and Waculla Rivers”, the point where said road _ter- 
minated. This was the first right of way grant in favor of railroads, the 
previous grant having been for a canal. 
Following this came an act approved July 2, 1836, granting the right 
of way “through such portion of the public lands as remain unsold”, not 
to exceed 80 feet in width, to the New Orleans and Nashville Railroad 
Company. ‘The first section of that statute required that a description 
of the route and surveys should be filed in the General Land Office 
within sixty days after the survey. The second section granted for depots, 
