O'Hara v. O'Brien

Citations

• 107 Cal. 309
• 40 P. 423
• 1895 Cal. LEXIS 752

Syllabus

<p>Boundaries—Monuments—Courses and- Distances.—Where no monuments, natural or artificial, called for by description, or by the field notes of a survey, are to be found, the courses and distances called for must control.</p> <p>Id.—Erroneous Survey on Section Line.—Where the original survey of a section shows that the section and quarter sections were full, and only the monuments fixing the eastern line of the section are found, it is error for a county surveyor, instead of starting from the northeast and southeast corners of the section, and surveying the section and quarter sections by courses and distances, so as to make them full, to attempt to start from a corner in another township, and assuming that certain fences had been located on section and quarter section lines, to survey so as to reduce the length of the south boundary line of the section to less than the eighty chains provided for in the original survey.</p> <p>Id.—Adverse Possession—Prescriptive Title—Insufficient Proof.— There is no proof of adverse possession sufficient to justify a verdict of title by prescription where it appears that the controversy related simply to the location of the division line between the northeast and northwest quarter of the section, and the defendants had never claimed title to any land in the northeast quarter, and had never inclosed the land in question; nor built a fence upon the line claimed by them within five years next before the commencement of the action, and had paid no taxes on any part of the land in question.</p> <p>Id.—Agreed Line—Agency—Absence of Authority.—An agent who has no authority to agree upon a division line, but was merely employed for the purpose of superintending the lands of the owner and leasing the same, does not bind the owner by staking a line and causing a furrow to be ploughed to indicate how far west the tenants should plough, nor does he thereby authorize the owner of the adjoining land to build a fence upon the line staked by such a