206 POLYNESIAN RESEARCHES. 
of the legal enactments, was that which regarded 
the boundaries of lands. This law required that 
all disputes about land-marks should be referred to 
the judges, or settled by the decision of a jury; 
and that the boundaries of all the lands, fields, 
&c. throughout the island, should be carefully 
ascertained, and, with the dimensions, descrip¬ 
tions of the land, and the names of the owners, 
should be entered in a book called the Book of the 
Boundaries of Lands. A copy of the boundaries of 
oach land, with the name of its owner, signed by the 
principal judge, and sealed with the king’s seal, 
was to be prepared, as a document or legal title to 
the possession of such land in perpetuity. 
Many difficulties presented themselves in adjust¬ 
ing the rights of different claimants to the same 
lands. Prior to the introduction of Christianity, the 
lands often changed owners during the internal wars 
that prevailed; and the descendants of those who at 
this anterior time possessed or occupied the land, 
preferred their claims. But as those who possessed 
the lands at the abolition of idolatry, held them 
either as the fruits of conquest, or the gifts of the 
king, it was decreed that those who possessed 
them then should be considered as their lawful 
owners, and that no claim referring to a period 
antecedent to this, should be admitted. This law, 
by which the lands of the islands were made the 
freehold property of their possessors, is one of the 
most important in its influence on property that 
had yet been enacted. The unalianable right 
in the soil would thus descend from the father to 
the son, and no man could be deprived of this 
natural right but by a flagrant violation of the laws 
of his country. 
In the year 1824, when the infant, Pomare III, 
