The main legal point established in the judgment is that adverse possession and immemorial possession may establish ownership for certain portions of the property, but the rights can be extinguished by the Forest Act reservation.

1. The plaintiffs in the suit out of which these appeals arise are the trustees of the Kuthalanathaswami temple of Courfeallam, the defendant being the Secretary of State for India. The plaintiffs sue to establish their title to about three acres of land lying immediately to the south of what are admittedly the temple premises, demarcated as S. No. 482 of Courtallam village. The land sued for is valueless for cultivation purposes, but its importance lies in the fact that it contains the famous Courtallam waterfall and bathing pool, and sundry mantapams and sacred sites adjacent thereto. The plaintiffs claim the site in virtue of immemorial possession as part of the temple precincts and also by adverse possession for more than the statutory period. The defendant denies that there has been any exclusive or adverse possession of any portion of the disputed site on the part of the plaintiffs, and further pleads that by virtue of its inclusion in block No. Ill of the Tenkasi reserved forest in 1883 all pre-existing rights which may have existed have become extinguished.

2. The learned Subordinate Judge has found that only a portion of the disputed site falls within the reserved forest. The excluded portion contains the bathing pool, the lower portion of the hill side immediately above it and the various mantapams; and in his decree, he recognises the temples title to the following:

A. The whole of the site below the pool including the Sandhyavandana mantapam and the site of the Kasilingaswami shrine destroyed by flood in 1891 (Nos. 5 and 4 on the plan, exhibit P).

B. The bridge (No. 10).

C. The Tirthavari mantapam and its verandahs on the eastern side (Nos. 6 and 7).

D. The site of the foot of the waterfall.

E. The pool itself (No. 2).

F. The rock above the falls on which the Sivalingams are out.

3. He also recognises its right to carry on the customary puja at the falls and at the Tirthavari mantapam and the necessary right of way from the bridge to the foot of the falls and to the pool called Pongumakadal half way up the bill. The rest of the plaintiffs claim is dismissed: and the decree farther declares that the waterfall itself, the remainder of the hill-slopes, and the river bed belong to Government subject to the bathing rights of the European community and high-caste public conformably to the rights of the temple to carry on customary worship.

4. Against this decree both parties appeal.

5. It is convenient first to consider the question of the rights of the parties without reference to the reservation under the Forest Act, and then to determine the manner and extent to which they are affected by the Act. This is also the procedure followed by the learned Subordinate Judge.

6. In connection with the first question, some preliminary remarks are necessary, The learned vakil for the plaintiffs has argued with considerable force that his clients claim should be considered not so much as an attempt to prove a title as against Government by 60 years adverse possession, as to establish exclusive possession as owner for a sufficiently long period to give rise to the presumption of a "lost grant." As far as the decision of this case goes, however, this is a distinction without a difference. The Subordinate Judge has not rejected any portion of the plaintiffs claim on the ground that the period of their proved enjoyment was deficient; nor do we see any reason to do so. The vital point is as to the nature of the enjoyment. Whether enjoyment is set up as the basis of a title by prescription, or as evidence on which a lost grant should be presumed, the same characteristics will be necessary. The plaintiffs relied upon the decisions of the House of Lords in Lord Advocate v. Lord Blantyre (1879) 4 A.C. 770 and Lord Advocate v. Young (1887) 12 A.C. 544, but we do not think the evidence in the present case brings it within the principle of these decisions.

7. In the second place, it must be observed that it is impossible to treat the area covere