CUNNINGHAM v. BROWNING. 315

prietary. The power to grant acts of grace and favour, which,
under the proprietary government, had been thus confided first to a
cduncil for lands, and then to judges of the Land Office, was, after
the revolution, recognised as having devolved upon the Chancel-
lor; and it has accordingly been always so exercised by him; but,
it is merely a power to revise certain proceedings in respect to the
sale of public lands, and to correct immaterial errors in cases,
which involved none of that judicial power proper and necessary
for the management and determination of controversies between
two or more citizens, such as that which was then, and is now
exercised by the Chancellor in determining on a caveat case.(a)

A caveat, in the Land Office, is a warning to the Chancellor not
to put the great seal to a patent for a certain tract of land as
prayed by the holder of the certificate of the survey. As all that
relates to patents for land belongs properly to the common law
side of the Court of Chancery, here as well as in England, it
necessarily follows, that a caveat must be the commencement of a
judicial proceeding on the same side of the court with that to
which it is opposed; and consequently, as to all controversies
brought before the Chancellor, by caveat, he holds a common law
court of record; or as it was formerly said, the proceedings are
in " the Chancery Court of Records," not in a mere court of
equity.(b) And considering it as a court of record, it has, like all
courts of common law or of equity of that description, the power
to regulate its own practice and proceedings; which regulations
become the law of the court, and of the case also, so far as they
apply.(c) And as a grant for land can only be obtained through
the Land Office, in which all the preliminary preparations for it are
deposited, it follows, that a caveat can only be presented to the
Chancellor in that office; and, in general, after the proceedings
have been so far matured as to be ready to have the great seal put
to the grant, (d) A caveat is most usually entered by a simple
endorsement of the word " caveat" upon the certificate, if there be
one returned to the office; or otherwise by a note on the record
opposite to the warrant, without any specification whatever of the
cause of caveat ;(e) but it can only be entered by the interested
party himself, or by the direction in writing of his attorney.(f)
And when entered, it cannot be permitted to continue longer than

(a) Land Ho. Ass. 273, 484; November, 1781, ch. 20.—(b) land Ho. Aas, m,
465.—(c) Land Ho. Ass 434, 442, 461.—(d} Land Ho. Ass. 467.—(e) Land Ho.
Ass. 321, 379, 487.—(f) Land Ho. Ass. 442, 443 487, 491.