404 THE FUTURE OF OUR AGRICULTURE. 



an " Abstract of Title " and the rest of it. All this work is 

 done, and reliably done, by special experts, under the Regis- 

 trar, who examines the deeds and has all the points coming 

 into account at his fingers' ends. 



None of the difficulties and uncertainties which timid 

 minds at first apprehended and foretold have occurred in 

 practice. In an old country like ours, with a labyrinthine 

 network of laws affecting real property, and with wide 

 ramifications of families, it was naturally dreaded that 

 rival claims might be set up, running counter to the Regis- 

 trar's entries. Indeed, some people thought that nothing 

 short of a new Solonic seisachtheia — corresponding to the 

 first Napoleon's despotic : Possession vaut litre, which settled 

 the matter in France as by an Alexandrine sword-cut, 

 simply quashing claims — would be able to introduce order 

 into the confusion always threatening. All this has proved 

 a simple nightmare. There has, indeed, been less of any 

 approach to competing claims to ownership in the old country 

 than in Australia, where, as one would have thought, on 

 a tabula rasa of new ground, entanglements by rival claims 

 could scarcely occur. There have been more there than 

 among ourselves. To guard against any loss by such in 

 Australia, a trifling levy has been made upon entries in the 

 register, which some years ago had yielded as a collective 

 result a sum of about £400,000 — against which only about 

 ;£i4,ooo had been adjudged as due. In this country even 

 such precaution — it is \d. in the £ in Australia — was con- 

 sidered — and rightly considered, as the event has shown 

 — superfluous. In truth, our old title deeds have been so 

 carefully inquired into by the parties concerned that the 

 occurrence of doubtful cases is extremely improbable. As 

 security against such, the reserve fund accumulated out 

 of fees appears more than adequate. In fact up to the time 

 of writing only one diminutive case, involving a sum of 

 about £400, has arisen ; and in that the rights of the matter 

 are not by any means clear, although judgment has been 

 pronounced. Our English system really marks an advance 

 upon the Australian, because it provides for the entry of 

 settlements, easements and the like in fact of all charges 



