The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1880-10-30
Supreme Court-In Banco-0ctober Term,
1880.
KALELA EFT AL VS.. JAMES LEMON.
Harris, c. II. .Judd and Nc CtHu. j. II
Opinion By Nc Gully, j.

This was an action of Ejectment, verdict
for the plaintiffs, exceptions taken to the in
structions given to the jury and to the re-
fusal of instructions prayed for, set forth in
| the bill as follows
/. The Court said, 1.-THE defence by 20
| years pos session must be in your minds In.
| questionable, hostile and Uninterrupted, to
which the defendant by his counsel excepted.
9. The counsel for the defence asked the
Judge to lnstru ct the jury that " In regard
to the defence by prescription, no evidence
relating to the other piece of land not in the
case is to be considered" which the court
refused to give and charged instead.
3. That inasmuch as the pieces were in
one award and claimed under the same title
and that Kahiuka defendants grantor) had
| put in issue by his evidence his possession
of the naduk0 piece claiming it likewise by
the same title under which he claimed the
naaAai piece (the lot in question: in that
way the evidence became relative to the
issue, to which refusal and Instructions in
stead, the defendant by his counsel excepted.
To explain the foregoing it may be s tated
that the plaintiff (her husband being joined)
claimed the piece of land for which action is
brought by virtue of being the grand
daughter of Napohaku, he, the brother a nd
/ sue ucII VI Adluul, IL WuOuH Iuo tldUu
was awarded by the Land Commission.
Kaluhi's patent which was exhibited from
the plaintiffs hands, embraces two pieces.
Apana l. A pa-hale or house lot in Hamo-
hamo, on he sea beach, containing 35-1O0
acre, being the lot incontroversy, and {, "He
mau loi, some taro patches, and a water right
in Niukukahi. These pieces are not adjacent
to each other, the precise distance apart is
! not made known, but they lie in the same
district of Waikiki. This patent is like hum
dreds of others which granted, pursuant to
awards, two or more detached lots of land,
securing to the native tenant, his house lot
on dry land, very frequently on or near the
sea beach, and his taro patches inland,
whereby he might live according to the Ha-
| waiian way.
The naked principle for which the coun-
sci contends, namely that where sundry de-
tached prices are granted in a royal patent,
a prescriptive right might be acquired in one
of them by adverse possession for more than
twenty years, without regard to the holding
of the other lots, and that the holding of
such othe lots by the party having the
! paper title or by right of inheritance, would
not defeat the title gained by pr escriPtion,
is sound.
1t often happens that the original grantee
of sundry parcels under one award conveys
them to different persons, or that the titles
are divided by devise or distribution of
estate, and doubtless the several parcels
cease to be affected by the aaecus of the
original grant. Fl
Or if the owner of separate tracts of land
conveys them by single deed, it is not
doubted that any one piece might afterwards
come to be affected by prescription, without
regard to the history of other. parcels.
We d o not hold that the doctrine of pos
session of a portion of an estate, tract or
parcel of land as a possession of the whole,
applies to the possession of one piece out of
several pieces, only from the fact of such
different pieces having been coupled in the
grant.
Examining the testimony which comes up
with the bill we find that the plaintiff offers
evidence that the estate fell from Kaluhi, the
patentee. at his death in 1854 OF earlier, to
his brother Napohaku as his sole heir-that
Napohaku held the estate, both pieces. till
his death, during the present reign in 1874
or later; and evidence that she is the
grand daughter and heir of Napohaku.
7 To meet this case the defendant offers tes-
timony that his grantor. Kahuika, was the
heir of Kaluhi, and had succeeded to his es-
tate upon his death, SO thatihe now held it
by right of inheritance as well as by a pos