Davey

This is an appeal by the defendant from an order denying his motion for a new trial, upon a statement of the case.

The action was brought to quiet title to certain land situated in Nevada county. The plaintiff claims title through a homestead patent issued to him by the government of the United States in the month of August, 1893. The defendant’s claim of title is based upon an alleged purchase of the land from the Central Pacific Railroad Company on the first day of June, 1891, it being contended that said land was embraced within the grant to said railroad company from the general government, by virtue of an act of Congress of the United States, approved July 1, 1862, entitled “An Act to aid in the construction of a railroad and telegraph line from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean and to secure to the government the use of the same for postal, military and other purposes,” [12 Stats. 489], and an act amendatory thereof, approved July 2, 1864, [13 Stats. 356], by which the United States granted to said railroad company “each odd-numbered section on each side of the line of its railroad to be located as provided by said acts and which was within twenty miles of said line.”…