ALASKA. 87 



patent, under like circumstances and conditions, and upon similar proceedings, 

 as are provided for vein or lode claims ; but where the lands have been pre- 

 viously surveyed by the United States, the entry in its exterior limits shall 

 conform to the legal subdivisions of the public lands. 



Sec. 2330. Legal subdivisions of forty acres may be subdivided into ten-acre 

 tracts; and two or more persons, or associations of persons, having contiguous 

 claims of any size, although such claims may be less than ten acres each, may 

 make joint entry thereof; but no location of a placer-claim, made after the 

 ninth day of July, eighteen hundred and seventy, shall exceed one hundred and 

 sixty acres for any one person or association of persons, which location shall 

 conform to the United States surveys; and nothing in this section contained 

 shall defeat or impair any bona fide pre-emption or homestead claim upon agri- 

 cultural lands, or authorize the sale of the improvements of ariy' bona fide settler 

 to any purchaser. 



Sec. 2331. Where placer-claims are upon surveyed lands, and conform to 

 legal subdivisions, no further survey or plat shall be required, and all placer- 

 mining claims located after the tenth day of May, eighteen hundred and seventy- 

 two, shall conform as near as practicable with the United States svstem of 

 public-land surveys, and the rectangular subdivisions of such surveys, and no 

 such location shall include more than twenty acres for each individual claimant; 

 but where placer-claims can not be conformed to legal subdivisions, survev and 

 plat shall be made as on unsurveyed lands; and where by the segregation of 

 mineral lands in any legal subdivision a quantity of agricultural land less than 

 forty acres remains, such fractional portion of agricultural land may be entered 

 by any partv qualified by law, for homestead or pre-emption purposes. 



Sec. 2332. Where such person or association, they and their grantors, have 

 held and worked their claims for a period equal to the time prescribed by the 

 statute of limitations for mining-claims of the State or Territory where the same 

 may be situated, evidence ot such possession and working ot the claims for such 

 period shall be sufficient to establish a right to a patent thereto under this chapter, 

 in the absence ot any adverse claim; but nothing in this chapter shall be deemed 

 to impair any lien which may have attached in any way whatever to anv mining- 

 claim or property thereto attached prior to the issuance of a patent. 



Sec. 2333. Where the same person, association, or corporation is in possession 

 of a placer-claim, and also a vein or lode included within the boundaries thereof, 

 application shall be made for a patent for the placer-claim, with the statement 

 that it includes such vein or lode, and in such case a patent shall issue for the 

 placer-claim, subject to the provisions of this chapter, including such vein or 

 lode, upon the payment of five dollars per acre for such vein or lode claim, and 



