The Absence Of Defined Boundaries Has Facilitated These
Encroachments.
According to an official report this difficulty is dwelt
upon most forcibly as requiring immediate investigation.
The vague
definition in title-deeds, which simply mentions the number of donums,
affords no means of proving an unjust extension; such terms are used as
"the woods bounded by a hill," or "the woods bounded by uncultivated
land," and this indefinite form of expression leaves a margin of
frontier that is practically without limit, unless the invader may be
stopped by arriving within a yard of his nearest neighbour. My
informant, Colonel Warren, R. A., chief commissioner of Limasol, assured
me that some holders of land in his district, whose titles show an
amount of ninety donums, lay claim to ten times the area. There is
hardly a proprietor who does not occupy a ridiculous surplus when
compared with his title-deeds, and the encroachments are even now
proceeding.
This system of land-robbery was connived at by the officials for a
"CONSIDERATION;" old title-deeds were exchanged for new on the
application of the holder, and the seals of the venal authorities
rendered them valid, at the same time that hundreds of acres were
fraudulently transferred from the state. When the intention of a British
occupation was made public, a general rush was made for obtaining an
excess over the amount defined in the title-deeds, by the swindling
method; and the extent to which this plunder was extended may be
imagined from the fact that 40,000 such documents were awaiting the
necessary signatures when, by the arrival of the British officials, the
Turkish authority, who could not sign the deeds with sufficient
expedition, was dismissed, and the false titles were invalidated.
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