APPENDIX A 



EXISTING METHODS OF MAKING SURVEYS AND DIVID- 

 ING RURAL LANDS 



By H. L. Seymour, B.A.Sc, A.M.Can.Soc. of C.E. ) D.L.S.,O.L.S.,etc. 



A map of Canada large enough to admit of such features 

 being shown will present numerous small quadrilaterals — or, in many 

 cases, irregular figures with more than four sides. These repre- 

 sent townships, which, for the greater part of Canada that has been 

 surveyed for settlement, may be regarded as the units of land divi- 

 sion. The word "township," as originally used in the Old Country, 

 had reference more particularly to the district or territory of a town. 

 In the sense in which it is now used in Canada an early, if not the 

 earliest, record of the term "township" appears in the Ordinances 

 of the Congress of the United States for the year 1786, when provi- 

 sion for the "locating and disposing of lands in the western territory" 

 was made. 



Closer inspection of the maps of Canada reveals the fact that, 

 in the earlier settled parts of the older provinces, the townships are 

 generally of all shapes and sizes, lying in no particular direction and 

 exhibiting frequently no apparent correlation. In the newer provinces 

 of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta the numerous townships 

 that have been laid out appear to be squares and of equal size, the 

 boundaries being north and south lines or east and west lines, which 

 will be found to scale six miles in length. That a definite relation 

 may, or rather does, exist between the townships is readily apparent 

 to the observer as his eye passes over the "checkerboard" superim- 

 posed on our western plains. 



A history of the township surveys made throughout Canada as a 

 whole would be a very varied one. As might be expected from the 

 irregular shapes and sizes of the townships in the older provinces, 

 many changes in the system, or, as it has sometimes been put, many 

 changes due to lack of system, have taken place there. This is 

 especially true of the province of Ontario, and, to a lesser extent, of 

 Quebec, in which province the prevailing direction of the St. Law- 

 rence river, and the seignorial grants bordering thereon and extend- 

 ing many miles back therefrom, have been determining factors in 

 township surveys. The three western provinces, however, have had 

 the same system of survey, with but minor exceptions, since they 

 were first systematically divided for settlement. There the original sur- 

 vey into townships has been, and still is, under control of the Federal 

 Government. 



In general, the earliest surveys might be regarded as an endeavour 

 to apportion in an equitable manner the claims of settlers already on 



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