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chase money and the balance should be paid when a Lease was rooted or a Certificate of title issued defining the exact boundaries of the ground and accordingly the Purchasers, believing (as was the case) that the Vendor had shown acquired the absolute title to 200ft by 850ft of ground and desiring that completion should be delayed until the boundaries were fixed and a Government Lease or Certificate granted, paid over to the Vendor $3,500 on account of purchase money and incurred very considerable costs in the preparation of plans and legal expenses.
On the 14th July 1902 a letter was addressed by the Colonial Secretary to Messrs. Deacon & Hastings the then Solicitors for the Vendor (copy enclosed) stating that the Crown Lease to the area would be issued in due course and on the 1st of September 1908 another letter was written enclosing a tracing of the area which the Government was prepared to lease. Objections were made to some of the conditions under which the Lease was to be granted and in or about the month of March 1908 you gave notice under Section 14 of Ordinance 18 of 1900 that the matter was referred back to the Land Court to decide what compensation should be paid to the claimants and we therefore applied to the Land Court to add the names of the Purchasers as claimants who were requested to forward a written statement of the particulars of our clients' claim.
9. We also on behalf of the Purchasers on the 31st of July 1908 formally called upon His Excellency the Governor of the Colony to grant to our clients a title to the Land which our clients agreed to purchase.
10. The Government then proceeded to pass Ordinance No.15 of 1908 which enabled the Government to appeal from the decision of the Land Court and having passed the Ordinance they appealed and upset the decision of the Land Court in the Vendor's favour.
11. We therefore think that our clients the Purchasers are under all the circumstances of the case entitled to have a fair and reasonable compensation allowed to them for the money they have spent and trouble they have taken in the matter. It must be granted that
OUR