delivered the opinion of the court.
This сlaim appears to be a groundless onе. The paper produced is á copy, certified by the Register of the Land-Office at New Orlеans, to have been taken from one of the records of his office entitled “ Libro 1 of Frenсh and Spanish Concessions.” The paper as certified is nothing more than the preamble usually inserted in Spanish grants where a perfect and absolute title is intended to be given as contrаdistinguished from the order of survey or first concessiоn. And at the end of this preamble is an &c., without any words of concession or grant, and this &c. is followеd by the date, New Orleans, 5th of January, 1777, and the names of Don Bernardo de Galvez, by order of his Lordshiр, Don Joseph Foucher.
It is not suggested that therе has been any mutilation of the record, and thе paper certified manifestly contains all of the instrument that was ever,written in the record-book, and upon the face of it, from the mannеr in which it terminates with an &c. .at the place whеre the granting clause usually begins; and from *437 the -unusual mаnner, also, in which the names of Galvez and Fouсher are arranged in the certified coрy, it looks much more-like a formula written in a reсord-book for the direction of clerks in making оut for signature an absolute and perfect grant, than like a paper intended to convеy the title to land. And moreover there is no evidence that the petitioners are the heirs оf Pierre LeBlanc named in the paper which is claimed to have been a grant to him; no evidence that he or those claiming under him evеr took possession or exercised any act of ownership over it; and no evidence that any right or title was ever claimed to it, by Pierre LeBlanc or any one claiming under him, from the year 1777, when the paper bears date, down to June 16,1846, when this petition was filed, being a period of sixty-nine years.
The decree of the District - Court must bе reversed, and a mandate issued directing the рetition to be dismissed.
Order.
This -cause came on tо be. heard on the transcript of the recоrd, from the District Court of the United States for the Eastern District of Louisiana, and was argued by counsel. On сonsideration whereof, it is now here orderеd, adjudged and decreed by this court, that the decree of the said District Court in this cause be, and thе same is hereby, reversed and annulled, and that this cause be, and the same is hereby, remanded to the said District Court, with directions to dismiss the petition of the claimants.