OF COLONIAL MARYLAND 27

real nature and importance—the extension and improvement of one's
land. Though there were theoretical restrictions, the resurvey war-
rant was permitted to serve a variety of advantageous purposes
such as the excluding of bad and taking in of better lands, obtaining
allowance. for actual deficiency, for water comprehended in the first
survey or ground subsequently washed away, etc. ³⁷

Escheat warrants also present an enormous figure on the records,
partly no doubt, for the same reason as the resurvey warrants. The
practice of escheat—whereby land escheated or reverted to the Lord
Proprietor—was an inheritance from the feudal system of land
tenure. In practice a man might present a petition to the land
authorities stating that his neighbor had died without heirs and
requesting a decision as to whether the land was liable to escheat or
not. If the decision of the investigating jury confirmed the escheat-
ability of the land, the petitioner then applied for an escheat war-
rant and was usually given preference over others as the "dis-
coverer", in obtaining the warrant. (Since escheats were not easily
traceable by the land officers, it was the policy to give some premium
to discoverers). ³⁸ This sort of warrant brought with it the same
privileges already mentioned in connection with resurvey warrants.
The type did not occur frequently before the last quarter of the 17th
century but increased greatly after that and continued to be issued
down to the Revolution. In the latter part of the proprietary period,
however, proclamation warrants came to supersede escheat warrants
to a considerable extent especially in cases of land reverting for
reasons other than lack of heirs. The warrants in question are
founded upon three successive proclamations of Charles, Lord Balti-
more, whereby persons who had made surveys comprehending vacant
or escheat land, and who neglected to pay or compound therefor, and
to take out their patents within a limited time, were subjected to
the loss of all the rights derived from such surveys; the lands be-
coming by means of such omission liable to be taken by the first dis-
coverer, under new warrants to be obtained for that purpose. ³⁹

Surplus warrants are unique in that they were issued for a very
short period only—between 1735 and 1738. They represent an
attempt on the part of the Lord Proprietor to recover some of the
excess of land included with the bounds of surveys beyond the

³⁷ Ibid., p. 134-5.

³⁸ Ibid., p. 174.
¹⁹ Ibid., p. 186-7.