THE GOVERNMENT OF THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS, APPLICANT AND APPELLANT, VS. CAROLINA MONTILLA ET AL., CLAIMANTS-APPELLANTS AND APPELLEES.

Both the Government of the Philippine
Islands and the claimants, Carolina Montilla et al., appealed from the
decision of the Court of First Instance of Pangasinan in cadastral case
No. 42, G. L. R. O. Record No. 1373, involving the title to three
parcels of land containing 778 hectares, 52 ares and 84 centiares
situated in the barrio of Mabilao, municipality of San Fabian, in the
Province of Pangasinan. Besides these parties a number of applicants
for free patents and homesteads presented their claims to different
portions of the land in question.

The Government concedes to the claimants-appellees, Carolina
Montilla et al., the 189 hectares and 34 ares of the 768 hectares
involved in this proceeding shown upon the plan Ig-307 (Rs-352),
Exhibit E, by virtue of the judgment rendered in favor of Eduardo
Montilla, their father, in G. L. R. O. Record No. 742, on May 26, 1908.
The issue here between the Government and the Montillas involves the
remainder of said lands, being 579 hectares more or less. Of the latter
the trial court awarded 200 hectares to the claimants-appellees
excluding therefrom several tracts to which title had been previously
granted to others in other land registration cases. The Government’s
principal assignments of error are that the trial court erred in not
finding that the claimants-appellees are entitled to only 189 hectares
and 34 ares of the land in question and in not holding that, with the
exception of the said 189 hectares and 34 ares, the remaining lands
shown in said Exhibit E are public lands.

We have come to the conclusion that these assignments of error are
well taken. It has been impossible for us to figure out from the
decision of the trial court or from the evidence and documents of
record the description of the “otra extensi6n de dos cientas hectareas”
which the trial court awarded to the claimants-appellees. If this tract
lies to the east of the 189 hectares and 34 ares conceded to the
claimants by the Government, it has been occupied by various
homesteaders for many years and the evidence is not convincing that any
part of it was ever put in cultivation and kept in continuous
possession by the claimants-appellees or their predecessors in title.
Exhibits 14, 15 and 17 are offered by the claimants-appellees as the
basis of their title to the 200 hectares awarded to them by the trial
court. Exhibit 17, dated in Manila, December 20, 1888, is a notice from
the Intendente General de Hacienda calling on Manuel Santa
Maria to pay the sum of P477.42 for a composition title “de un terreno
que posee en los sitios o barrios denominados Rabon, Tiblon y Mamanpan”
in the Province of Pangasinan. Exhibit 20, dated in Manila, October 9,
1889, is a communication from the Inspector General of Forestry
addressed to the Intendente General de Hacienda calling
attention to the fact that P165 of the amount paid for his composition
title as stated in Exhibit 17 should be refunded to Manuel Santa Maria
because of an error in the survey, the former charge based on an area
of 289 hectares and 34 ares instead of 189 hectares and 34 ares.
Plainly, therefore, Exhibits 17 and 20 show that Manuel Santa Maria,
the predecessor in title of the appellees, acquired a composition title
to 189 hectares and 34 ares and no mention is made in said composition
title of the additional 200 hectares now claimed by the appellees.
There is therefore no documentary evidence of any valid title to the
200 hectares of public land awarded by the trial court to the appellees.

These exhibits were all before the Court of First Instance of
Pangasinan in Record No. 742 and were likewise offered in that case as
a basis of Montilla’s claim of title, and the court then found and held
that the claim to additional lands beyond the 189 hectares and 34 ares
was not supported by the evidence and denied the registration thereof
in favor of the then applicant Eduardo Montilla through whom the
present appellees claim. From an axamination of the entire record we
are convinced that in the absence of any new or additional evidence the
former decision in the Court of First Instance in said case No. 742 was
correct and should have been followed by the trial court in the present
case.

In view of the foregoing, the judgment appealed from is modified by
adjudicating to the claimants-appellees the 189 hectares and 34 ares of
the lands here involved awarded to the claimants-appellees by the trial
court and declaring the rest of the lands shown upon plan Ig-307
(Rs-352), Exhibit E, to be public lands, subject, however, to the
existing rights of the applicants for homesteads and free patents, with
costs in this instance against the claimants-appellees.

Malcolm, Hull, Imperial, and Goddard, JJ., concur.