Court Opinion

ID: 9807605
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 20:11:02.161501+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T11:48:19.319688
License: Public Domain

ClaRK, C. J.,
dissenting: Grant No. 566 contains the following calls: “100 acres lying and being in the county of Caldwell, on the waters of Buffalo. Begins at a white pine and two chestnut trees by the Falls of Pounding Mill Branch, and runs north 10 poles to a white pine, .corner of 150-aere tract, the same course with the line of said tract 86 poles to two white oaks on the east side of a hill (then east 167 poles to a stake in the line of a 50-acre tract), thence south with line 96 poles to a stake in a line running east from the beginning, then with that line west to the beginning. Entered 6 November, 1854.”
*468It was admitted that the beginning corner of Grant No. 566 as marked on the map, at the point 1, is the true beginning, and that the second corner is at the point marked W. P. on the map, 10 poles north of 1, and that such point is the corner of 150-acre tract. It was further admitted that the third corner of Grant 566 is at the point marked 2 W. 0., and that such point is 86 poles north of the white pine and 96 poles north of the beginning corner — the white pine and two chestnuts by the Falls of “Pounding Mill Branch” — and that the two white oaks at the figure 2 are on the east side of a hill.
There was no difficulty whatever in locating the grant according to course and distance, especially with these points admitted. The court properly charged that, under these circumstances, “course and distance control, and that the defendant’s title to the 100-acre grant would stop wherever the distance gave out and would go where the course carried it, regardless of the additional call, To the line of a 50-aere tract’; the court holding that that addition to the call was too indefinite, and the jury should find as a fact on the evidence that the corner was where the distance gave out and where the course went to.”
Surely this cannot be error, when to consider the additional call, “to the line of a 50-acre tract,” would make the call indefinite and uncertain, and indeed render uncertain that which before was certain.
It has been universally held by this Court in a line of decisions beginning .as far back as Harry v. Graham, 18 N. C., 76, and continuing to the present, that “the course and distance called for must control unless there is another call more definite and certain than course and distance.”
The additional call here is “to a stake in a 50-acre tract.” This could not possibly be madé more indefinite nor uncertain. It is a call for an unfixed and unmarked point and in no particular grant. The grant is not even designated by the name of a grantee. There is evidence that there are three 50-aere tracts near this grant. One is east, though it is marked 25 acres; another a little south of east, which the defendant wishes the jury to guess is the one intended, and another nearly *469southeast. Indeed, “50-acre” tracts in that section are known to be as thick as the traditional blackberry.
Besides, there is no evidence whatever that the lines of the 50-acre tract which the defendant “guesses” is the correct one had been surveyed at the time that Grant No. 566 was taken out. It was stated on the argument that in fact it had not been, but that merely the east line thereof had been laid down on a plat. As the first line of said grant was on the east side of it, the west line of that tract, which would be the line in which the “stake” would necessarily be, could not be designated, and there was nothing to show the shape of said tract or where the west line would be found.
It is impossible to find a more uncertain call than for a stake, in the unsurveyed west line, of a 50-acre tract, which is not identified, whose owner is not even known, and the shape of which was not indicated. The west line, when finally surveyed, might be nearer or farther from the east line of said tract. The owner of the tract is not named, the west line is not located, and "a 50-acre tract” is common in that section, and three of them are shown in this evidence to be somewhere more or less east of Grant No. 566.
It is true that in Cherry v. Slade, 7 N. C., 82, the Court held that when the boundary of. another tract is called for it would be considered a natural boundary and more certain than course and distance, “provided it he sufficiently established.” In Lumber Co. v. Hutton, 152 N. C., 537, the Court held that when the course, distance, number of acres, and plat are more definite, and the application of the call for the boundary of another tract was inconsistent, the latter must give place to the former, for “the reason for the rule had ceased.” The rule in Cherry v. Slade is not a statute, neither is there any sacredness attaching to it. It was simply a judicial expression of the opinion that when under the circumstances the boundary of another tract offered more certainty than 'the other descriptions, the call for the boundary should govern.
In Lumber Co. v. Hutton, 159 N. C., 445, it was held that the call for the boundary should govern, because additional evidence had been offered on the second trial, which showed *470that the boundary of another tract was “a well recognized and established line,” and was so found to be by the jury. But even then there were two dissenting opinions, for the result had been to give the grantee -fourteen times the acreage named in his grant and plat. That surely should have been the ultima thule of the doctrine; but if we are now to hold that, notwithstanding definite courses and distances and admitted corners, the call for a stake in the unmarked boundary of an unlocated tract of an indefinite owner is to govern by the force of attraction, then indeed we are on a boundless and uncharted sea, without course and distance, and with the- compass diverted from its direction by a power without limit and an attraction beyond calculation.
The general rule has always been that land must be located according to the primary calls of the deed, unless there are others more certain, and that an uncertain description should yield to one which is certain and less liable to disappoint the. intention of the parties. In the case at bar the call for a stake' unmarked in the line of “-a, 50-acre tract” is not a more certain call and does not bring this case within, the exception to the well-known general rule- that course and distance will govern, unless the line of another tract which is “known and established” is called for. To grant the defendant’s contention gives him 200 acres instead of the 100 which the State granted him and which is all he paid for.
Qherry v. Slade is not a general 'rule, but it is an exception to the general rule, and is only to be applied in 'those cases in which such exception is called for by reason of its furnishing greater certainty. The exception should not destroy and swallow up the rule. ' The description about which there is the least liability of error should be adopted, to the exclusion of the other. Campbell v. Branch, 49 N. C., 313.
There was no evidence by which the jury could locate “a” 50-acre tract called for in the defendant’s grant, nor any evidence that the west line of such tract, nor any line thereof, had been run and marked. The course and distance in Grant No. 566 were hot only the most certain means, but indeed the only' *471means by which, said grant could be located, and bis Honor properly told the' jury to follow the definite courses and distances therein given.
BeowN, J., concurs in dissent.'