Appeal from the Circuit Court of the United States for the Northern Division of the Western District of Washington.

Bill by the United States against the Washington Securities Company for the cancellation of patents to certain coal land patented under homestead entries and conveyed to defendant. From a decree in favor of complainant, defendant appeals.

By its bill filed in the court below the government sought the cancellation of four certain patents covering section 34, township 22 N., of range 7 E., of the Willamette meridian, in the Seattle land district, state of Washington, which were issued to four named individuals, for one-quarter of a section each, under and by virtue of the homestead law of the United States, the title to which subsequently passed to the appellant corporation from the pat-entees. The bill charges that all of the land mentioned was at all of the times therein referred to known mineral land, containing valuable deposits of coal in such quantities and of such character as rendered the land more valuable for the coal it contained than for agricultural purposes, which facts each of the patentees well knew at the time he made application to purchase a quarter section thereof under the homestead law, and at the time of final proof and the receipt of the patent, and all of which facts the appellant corporation well knew through its agents and officers at the time of its purchase, and further knew that all of the said land was known mineral land at the time the said respective patentees made application to purchase it under the homestead laws, and at the time they made their proofs under and pursuant to such applications and at the time they received the said patents. The bill makes similar allegations in respect to each of the patentees. It will be sufficient to state the substance of one of them, which is as follows: That on September 10, 1900, one Zachariah Turner filed with the proper officers of the United States Land Office at the city of Seattle, Wash., an application in writing and entered as a homestead the E. y2 of the E. % of section 34 of township 22 N., of range 7 E., of the Willamette meridan, and at the time of filing the same also filed his nonmineral affidavit in accordance with the duly established rules and regulations of the Land Office, in which affidavit he stated, among other things, that he was well acquainted with the character of the land applied for, and that there was not, to his knowledge, within the limits thereof, any deposit of coal; that thereafter, on the 9th day of January, 1902, the said Turner, desiring to commute his homestead entry upon the said land so applied for, made and filed in the said Land Office his final proofs, together with the nonmineral affidavit required by the rules and regulations of the Commissioner of the General Land Office, and in his-testimony upon final proof in the said Land Office testified upon oath, among other things, that the said land was most valuable for agricultural purposes, and that there was not any indication of coal on it; that the affidavit so made and filed and the testimony so given were false and fraudulent, as the said Turner well knew at the time, and were made and given by him for the purpose of fraudulently obtaining from the United States the title to said land; that the land was unfit for agricultural purposes, and was of no value therefor, but did contain valuable workable deposits of coal, all of which the said Turner at the time well knew;- that on the 9th day of January, 1902, the officers of the Seattle Land Office, based upon the said final proof, through mistake and inadvertence and without authority of law, issued to the said Turner a receiver’s receipt for the land so applied for by him, and thereafter, to wit, November 2, 1904, a patent was issued to him by the United States convoying the said land, which patent was issued through mistake and inadvertence on the part of the ofticors of the Land Office, and without authority of law: that on the 10th day of October, 1906, the said Turner and his wife, Mary Turner, by deed conveyed the said land to one C. J. Smith, who was at the time the agent of the defendant corporation for the purchase of the said land, and who acquired it solely for the use and benefit and in trust for the defendant to the suit, which corporation still holds the legal title thereto; that the said defendant corporation and its said agent well knew at the time of such purchase, and for a long time prior thereto, that the said land contained valuable deposits of coal and was mineral land, and was'unfit for agricultural purposes and of no value therefor, and was not subject to entry under the homestead laws of the United States.

The hill contains similar allegations in respect to all of the other portions of the section in question. It contains no charge of fraud against the defendant company or its agent, nor against any of the officers of the Land Office.

The defendant company by its answer admits, among other things, that the section of land in question contained and still contains valuable and workable deposits of coal, and that the patents were issued as alleged, and that the land covered by them was thereafter conveyed by the patentees to Smith as agent of the defendant company and was subsequently conveyed by him to the company, which still holds the legal title thereto. In other respects the answer put in issue the averments of the hill.