LAND LAWS. 



LITERATURE, AMERICAN, IX 1885. 529 



ed to railroads are liable to forfeiture to the 

 Government on account of the non-fulfillment 

 of the conditions of the grants, and Congress 

 has been strongly urged to declare these lands 

 forfeited and open to settlers. Originally it 

 was the policy of the Government to sell the 

 lands ceded to it by the various States, to ob- 

 tain money to pay the debt contracted in the 

 War for Independence, and this policy was 

 continued long after the debt had disappeared. 

 Great quantities of land came into the hands of 

 speculators, and actual settlers were placed at 

 great disadvantage. By-and-by the various pre- 

 emption laws were enacted in the interests of 

 settlers. To give still further encouragement 

 to those who wished to settle on the land and 

 till it, the homestead law was enacted after a 

 struggle which lasted twenty years. Other 

 acts regulating the sale of desert, timber, and 

 mineral lands have been passed. Partly by pur- 

 chases legitimately made and partly by fraudu- 

 lent entries made under these acts, companies 

 and individuals have acquired large and valu- 

 able tracts of land. An act was passed by 

 Congress at its last session to prevent the un- 

 lawful occupancy of the public lands, and re- 

 quiring the removal of all iuclosures hereto- 

 fore unlawfully placed on them, and the inves- 

 tigation of all false or fictitious illegal claims. 

 Since this act was passed, a considerable num- 

 ber of fraudulent entries have been canceled, 

 and the Government has taken measures to 

 carry out the provisions of the act. In the last 

 presidential election campaign both political 

 parties inserted in their platforms planks de- 

 claring that the public lands ought to be kept 

 as homesteads for actual settlers, and ought not 

 to be granted to railroads or other corpora- 

 tions, or allowed to come into the ownership of 

 non-resident aliens. The Land Commissioner 

 recommends the repeal of the pre-emption, 

 timber-culture, timber-land, and desert-land 

 acts, and of the commutation feature of the 

 homestead act. In this way the lands might 

 be sacured for actual settlers, although nearly 

 all the arable lands of ''the public domain have 

 already been taken up. 



The States have the right to grant and dis- 

 pose, as they see fit, of the lands which they 

 acquired as successors of the colonies, or by ces- 

 sion from the General Government, and which 

 have not yet been appropriated to the indi- 

 vidual ownership of citizens. The State gov- 

 ernments in general regulate the distribution, 

 descent, transfer, and tenure of land within 

 their respective boundaries. The English sys- 

 tem of land laws, which was brought over by 

 the colonists, has been greatly modified. Pri- 

 mogeniture was long ago abolished in the older 

 States, and has never been adopted in the 

 newer ; entails and settlements have been prac- 

 tically abolished or greatly restricted in their 

 operations ; the registration of titles and mort- 

 gages is general ; and cheap and simple meth- 

 ods of transfer have commonly been adopted. 

 Where land is rented, the relations of landlord 

 VOL. xxv. 34 A 



and tenant are usually of the simplest character 

 and rest chiefly on the basis of contract. There 

 is a constant tendency to assimilate the laws of 

 real property more and more to those which 

 relate to personal property, and which have 

 been derived largely from the equitable pro- 

 visions of the civil law. 



LITERATURE, AMERICAN, IN 1885. Fiftlon. 

 In looking over the lists of novels published in 

 America, the first impression one receives is 

 that American novelists are scarcely repre- 

 sented at all, so flooded are the lists with 

 names of cheap reprints of English work. One 

 of the publishers of cheap editions of foreign 

 books justifies the practice on the same prin- 

 ciple as that which urges the enforcement of 

 bad laws as the best means of getting rid of 

 them. On that basis we should conclude, from 

 the extent to which the practice is carried, 

 that the day of international copyright can not 

 be very far distant. The names of leading and 

 professional novelists naturally come first to 

 mind. " The Rise of Silas Lapham," by Will- 

 iam D. Howells, has, it is safe to say, been 

 more satisfactory to his readers than any other 

 among his later stories. He has, besides, added 

 two more to those amusing little farces which 

 have been so popular "The Elevator" and 

 "The Garroters." Dr. O. W. Holmes surprised 

 the readers of " The New Portfolio " by sliding 

 into a story, which was published later under 

 the title " A Mortal Antipathy " ; Bret Harte 

 has published " Maruja " and " By Shore and 

 Sedge"; Charles Egbert Craddock (Miss M. 

 N. Murfree) has wisely, it seems, chosen to fol- 

 low up her first successes by more work in 

 the same field, where she is at home, and which 

 is far from being exhausted, and has increased 

 her reputation by " The Prophet of the Great 

 Smoky Mountains." Her "Down the Ra- 

 vine " is a shorter story, for young people. 



F. Marion Crawford's "Zoroaster" seems 

 to have attracted much less attention than his 

 previous novels. Julian Hawthorne has pub- 

 lished " Love, or a Name," and Henry James, 

 " The Author of Beltraflao, and other Stories." 

 Edgar Fawcett's " Social Silhouettes," and Dr. 

 W. A. Hammond's "Mr. Oldmixon" and "A 

 Strong-minded Woman " (a sequel to " Lai ") 

 may, perhaps, serve to point the frequent ad- 

 monition to authors not to write too much. 

 Sarah O. Jewett's " A Marsh Island " sustains 

 her reputation for delicacy of touch and treat- 

 ment. Blanche W. Howard and Mary A. Tinck- 

 er have again taken foreign subjects in " Aul- 

 nay Tower " and " Aurora." " The Knave of 

 Hearts," by Robert Grant, is a series of social 

 sketches strung on a thread of story. E. W. 

 Howe, whose " Story of a Country Town " 

 was one of the successes of last year, follows 

 it with "The Mystery of the Locks," and Dr. 

 G. H. Picard, known only by " A Matter of 

 Taste," has gained some reputation by "A 

 Mission Flower." Admiral D. D. Porter's 

 " Allan Dare " is finished, and is followed by 

 "The Adventures of Harry Marline." Gen. 



