ART. 25.] COUNTY COMMISSIONERS—PUBLIC ROADS. 427

P. G. L., (1860,) art. 28, sec. 15. 1853, ch. 220, sec 3. 1884, ch. 364.
86. Whenever the county commissioners shall decide that it
is expedient that a road be opened as provided in the preceding
section, they may contract with the owner or owners of the land
through which the said road is intended to run, for the right of
way over the land necessary for said road, if he, she or they be
competent to contract; and in case the said county commissioners
shall so contract, they shall cause a plat of the said road to be made,
by a competent surveyor, and filed and recorded in the office of
the clerk of the circuit court for the county in which the deed or
deeds conveying the said lands are required to be recorded, which
said plat shall be referred to in, and shall be a part of said deed
or deeds; and the lands so conveyed shall be and become thence-
forth the property of the county, in the same manner and to the
same extent as other county roads, and no further, subject to the
public rights of way over the same; and it shall be lawful for the
said county commissioners of any county so to contract for land
for a public wharf, drains for county roads or other public use
or uses, which said land shall be the property of said county,
subject to said use or uses; and whenever the county commis-
sioners shall deem it expedient that examiners should be ap-
pointed to view the grounds for the purpose of opening, altering
or closing a road, they shall appoint three persons as examiners,
who shall be freeholders in the county, and not interested in or
holding lands through which the road is proposed to be opened,
altered or closed; but the appointment of examiners shall not
prevent the said county commissioners, at any time thereafter,
from contracting with the owner or owners, as above provided;
and the county commissioners of any county are authorized, when
the county roads cannot be conveniently drained by drains along
the said county roads, to make the same upon the property out-
side the limits thereof; and they shall contract for the lands that
may be required for that purpose, as above provided, or they
may proceed to condemn the lands that may be necessary for the
purpose under the provisions of sections 248 to 253, both inclu-
sive, article 23, Title, Corporations.

Ibid. sec. 16. 1853, ch 220, sec. 4.

87. The said examiners, before they proceed to act as such,
shall take an oath to execute the trust reposed in them by the