Stephen Johnson Field

“ The finding of the jury, being accepted as satisfactory, must be treated as if made by the court, and, being general, as covering all the issues. The only questions, therefore, we can consider on this writ of error are those arising from the rulings in the admission and rejection of evidence, and those respecting the inferences deducible from the proofs made. These rulings, so far as we deem them of sufficient importance to be noticed, relate to the evidence of the plaintiff's incorporation; to the evidence of the location of the plaintiff's mining claim ”

“ It confines its traverse to the existing right and ownership of the plaintiff in the whole of the mining claim, to its long possession of the premises, and to the possession of the plaintiff and its predecessors since the discovery and location of the mining claim, and then sets up the alleged forfeiture of the claim by the plaintiff and the defendant's relocation of it. ”

“ Mining lode claims are frequently found where there are no permanent monuments or natural objects other than rocks or neighboring hills. Stakes driven into the ground are, in such cases, the most certain means of identification. Such stakes were placed here, with a description of the premises by metes, and, to comply with the requirements of the statute as far as possible, the location of the lode is also indicated by stating its distance south of 'Vaughan's Little Jennie Mine,' probably the best known and most easily defined object in the vicinity. ”