On the other hand, the commissioners of New York considered their authority limited to " ascertaining " the boundary as originally defined ; no agreement was reached, and in August, 1859, each State appointed new commis- I sioners ; but at their conference at Port Chester, on 13th September, of that year, the same difference of views confronted the commission, and the conference resulted in no practical work. On the 3d of April, 1860, New York passed an act empow-ering the commission formerly appointed to survey and mark with suitable monuments the "line between the two States as fixed by the survey of 1731." Under this authority the New York commission fixed and marked the boundary line between the two States, placing monuments along the line at intervals of one mile from the Massachusetts line to the mouth of Byram River. The work was completed in the autumn of 1860.

Still unsettled, the question came up by Connecticut threatening to contest her claims, and in 1878 and 1879 both States appointed commissioners to establish the boundaries. An agreement was made, December 5, 1879, whereby the western boundary of Connecticut was fixed as the ex parte line surveyed by New York in 1860, which was the old line of 1731. Connecticut, therefore, gave up her claim to the twenty-six hundred acres in dispute, between the straight line and the line of 1731 as reached, in exchange for her southern boundary extended into the sound. That agreement was ratified by the Legis- ! latures of both States and confirmed by Congress during the session of 1880-81.