(i) Authorities Cited by Defendants. Brief for Defendants.-In Michigan the common law prevails and the rule is sustained by an unbroken line of authorities that a grant of land bounded by a stream, whether navigable in fact or not, carried with it the bed of the stream, to the center of the thread thereof. Lorman v. Benson, 8 Mich. 18; Butler v. Railroad Co., 85 Mich. 246.

The basic principles of law governing the doctrine of riparian ownership is laid down in, Hale, De Jure Maris, Chap. 1; King v. Warton, Holt. 499; Lord v. Sydney Commrs., 12 Moore, P. 6.

The rule applies to a mill pond as well as a natural stream, and such words as "to a stake on the bank" does not constitute any limitation. Hartz v. Ry. Co., 155 Mich. 337; Mansur v. Blake, 63 Me. 38; Harrison v. Keene, 3 Me. 474; Taylor v. Blake, 64 N. H. 392; Van Buren v. Baker, 12 N. Y. S. R. 209.

In Luce v. Carley, 24 Wend. 451 (N. Y.), the boundary ran "to a hemlock stake standing on the east bank of the river," and the court held that where the grant is so framed as to touch the water of the river, and then parties do not expressly except the river, one-half the bed of the stream is included by operation of law.

The reservation must be expressed and not implied. Butler v. Railroad, 85 Mich. 246.

The law of 1855 as to maintenance of bridges, was superseded and repealed by the passage of the revision act of 1909, and its technical repeal in 1915, was a mere formality, the act of 1909 is still in force under which we claim relief.

"Where a subsequent statute covers the whole ground occupied by an earlier statute, it repeals by implication the former statute, though there be no repugnance." Shannon v. People, 5 Mich. 85.