Chap. 87.--An ACT to amend sections 4, 7 and 15 of an act approyed
March 19, 1884, entitled an act to provide for the sale of lands de-
linquent for taxes and county levies, and to repeal section 16 of

said act.
Approved February 8, 1886.

1. Be it enacted by the general assembly of Virginia, That
sections four, seven and fifteen of an act approved March nine-
teenth, eighteen hundred and eighty-four, entitled an act to
provide for the sale of lands delinquent for taxes and county
lev'es, be amended and re enacted so as to read as follows:

§4. Within ninety days after receiving such list from the audi-
tor of public accounts the treasurer shall cause to be printed at
least five hundred notices (except that in counties of ten thou-
sand inhabitants or less two hundred notices shall be printed),
giving the name of owner, number of acres, location of land,
and aggregate of tax and levies delinquent, and set up one of
them at the front door of the courthouse on the first day of
the next county or corporation court, and one of said notices
he shall cause to be posted at each voting precinct in his
county or corporation, and elsewhere therein if he shall deem
it proper so to do; to each copy he shall subjoin a notice that
the real estate therein mentioned, or so much thereof as shall
be sufficient to satisfy the taxes on the same, and the interest
and commissions of five per centum to the treasurer, and the
costs of advertisement ratably proportioned, will be sold at
public auction between the hours of ten in the morning and
four in the evening, on the first day of the court of his county
or corporation which is held on or after the first day of August
eighteen hundred and eighty-six, at the front of the cour'-
house thereof, unless said taxes, interests, costs and commis-
sions shall be previously paid. The list received from the
auditor, or a copy thereof, he shall return to the clerk’s office
of his county or corporation court, which shal! be preserved
by the clerk, and shall be accepted as prima facie evidence of
the proper advertisement of the lands or lots therein mention-
ed, should the regularity of such advertisement be thereafter
drawn in question in any court; but in any case where the land
so advertised to be sold shall turn out not to be delinquent, or
in case there shall be a failure to sell any one or more of the
tracts of land advertised for sale, then the proportion of the
costs of advertisement that would otherwise be chargeable to
such tract or tracts shall be borne by the commonwealth, ex-
cept in any case where the failure to sell such land arises from
its redemption by the owner or any other person, in which
case such land so redeemed shall bear its proportion of the
costs of advertisement: provided that all costs incurred by the
several treasurers of the commonwealth prior to the passage of
this act shall be chargeable to the general fund arising from
said sales.

§7. Any person aggrieved by any entry made in the list of
delinquents may, at any time prior to the first day of July,
eighteen hundred and eighty-six, apply for relief to the court
of the county or corporation wherein such treasurer gave bond
and qualified, and the judge of said court, either in term time
or vacation, shall have the power to hear and determine such
applications. And such court or judge being satisfied, and so
certifying of record that the taxes or county levies assessed
against such applicant, or constituting a lien upon real estate
in which he is interested, have been paid at the office of the
auditor of public accounts, or in any other manner provided
for by law, or improperly assessed in part or in whole against
such real estate, or that such applicant is an innocent pur-
chaser for value of such real estate, without actual notice of
the lien existing thereon in favor of the commonwealth, prior
to the year eighteen hundred and eighty-four, shall correct
such list and exonerate such real estate from such delinquent
tax or levies, or so much thereof as appears not to be due;
but no real estate shall be released from taxes and levies prop-
erly assessed since the first day of January, eighteen hundred
and eighty-four, where the same have not bean paid. The
attorney for the commonwealth of the court wherein such no-
tice is made shall, whenever required by the court, be present
and resist the application. A copy of every such order for
exoneration shall be certified to the auditor of public accounts,
and another copy to the treasurer of the county or corpora-
tion, and when delivered to the treasurer shall restrain him
from making sale of the real estate or so much thereof as may
be released or exonerated by such order; and said order shall
operate as a release from such liability upon said land for the
taxes alleged to have been returned delinquent. And it shall
be the duty of the treasurer to correct the lists received by
him from the auditor, as hereinbefore provided, in, accordance
with the orders of the court of his county or corporation.

§15. The auditor of public accounts shall prescribe the form

of the deed to be executed by the clerk in pursuance of section

twenty, chapter thirty-eight of the Code of eighteen hundred
and seventy-three, and the recitals of the said deeds shall be
held as prima facie evidence of all the facts therein stated, in
all courts wherein the regularity of the sale of the land con-
veyed therein shall be brought in question.

2. Section sixteen of the act approved March 19, 1884, en-

titled an act to provide for the sale of lands delinquent for
taxes and county levies, be and the same is hereby repealed.
' 3, So far as such lists delivered to the Treasurer relate to
taxes levied for county purposes, including levy for school
purposes, the board of supervisors of any county may revise
such list, and may add thereto any real estate allowed by the
said board of supervisors in their annual settlements with the
treasurer, since the first day of April, eighteen hundred and
sixtv-five, as delinquent for county levies, but not embraced in
said list furnished by the auditor to the treasurer.

4. This act shall be in force from its passage.