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in consequence of the great pressure brought to bear upon the government by those who desired to procure their grants before the obnoxious Stamp Act should come into operation. On this head we have the authority of Surveyor General Morris. Referring to the grant of the township of Maugerville in 1765, he says:—
"The general grant of the township was made at a time when there was a great crowd of business in the publick offices on account of the Stamp Act's taking place and the people pressing hard for their grants to save the stamp duties. In this hurry in making out the Grant, they have called a Right five hundred acres, when it was intended that every Right in that Township should be a thousand acres on account of the Grantees being the first adventurers and also on account of there being a very great proportion of sunken lands and lakes within the limits of that Township."
If further testimony were needed as regards the loose and careless way in which grants were issued at that period we have it in a letter to Ward Chipman written by Col. Edward Winslow from Halifax, April 21, 1785, in which he says:—
"I had an interview with the Secretary and Surveyor General together . . . I acquainted them explicitly that a process in chancery would be instituted against Hauser's patent [or land grant] and that I came not to request but to demand authenticated copies of the original memorial and all the subsequent papers respecting that grant. To my astonishment they both say'd they were uncertain whether any memorial had been presented. In many instances grants were made on personal and verbal applications and it frequently happened when petitions were presented that those petitions were considered as insignificant papers and were not preserved."
Had this been A further proof of the laxity of the system in vogue appears in the fact that no plans were attached either to the grant of 1765 or to that of 1770. the case the controversy relative to the location of Red Head could never have occurred.
The contention of Messrs. Donaldson and Ansley that the Halifax officials were quite familiar with the lay of the land in the vicinity of St. John is liable to some exception. The maps of Lieut. R. G. Bruce and Charles Morris, however admirable in the main, were