1. REGISTRATION OF LAND; NATURE OF PROCEEDINGS IN. — The proceedings for the registration of land, under Act No. 496, are in rem and not in personam. A proceeding in rem, dealing with a tangible res, may be instituted and carried to judgment, without personal service upon the claimants within the state or notice by name to those outside of it. Jurisdiction is secured by the power of the court over the res. Such a proceeding would be impossible were this not so, for it would hardly do to make a distinction between the constitutional rights of the claimants who were known and those who were not known to the plaintiff, when the proceeding is to bar all. (Tyler v. Judges, 175 Mass., 71; Grey Alba v. De la Cruz, 17 Phil. Rep., 49.)

2. ID.; TORRENS SYSTEM; PURPOSE AND EFFECT. — The real purpose of the Torrens Land Registration system is to relieve the land of the burden of known as well as unknown claims. If there exist known and just claims against the title of the applicant, for the registration of his land under the Torrens systems, he gains nothing in effect by his registration, except in the simplicity of subsequent transfers of his title. The registration either relieves the land of all known as well as unknown claims absolutely, or it compels the claimants to come into court and to make there a record, so that thereafter there may be no uncertainty concerning either the character or the extent of such claims.

3. ID.; ID.; NOTICE OF APPLICATION. — The requirement that personal notice shall be a prerequisite to the validity of registration would absolutely prohibit the foreclosure of unknown claims, for the reason that personal notice could never be given to "unknown claimants." The great difficulty in land titles arises from the existence of possible unknown claimants. Known claimants can be dealt with. They furnish no valid impediment, in fact, to the transfer of title. Courts have held that in actions in rem; personal notice to owners of a res is not necessary to give the courts jurisdiction to deal with and to dispose of the res. It is admitted in the present case that the petitioner was not guilty of fraud. The record shows that she named all persons who might have any interest in the registration of her land. She is not charged even with negligence. She did all the law required her to do.

4. ID.; ID.; ID.; PERSONAL NOTICE. — Looked at either from the point of view of history or of the necessary requirements of justice, a proceeding in rem, dealing with a tangible res, may be instituted and carried to judgment without personal service upon the claimants within the state, or notice by name to those outside of it and not encounter any provision of the fundamental law of the land. Jurisdiction is secured by the power of the court over the res. Proceedings in the land court for the registration of land would be impossible were this not so, for it hardly would do to make a distinction between the constitutional rights of claimants who were known and those who were not known to the plaintiff, when the purpose of the proceeding is to bar all.

5. ID.; ID.; STATE CONTROL OVER PROPERTY. — The law, even before the Torrens Law, provided means by which title to land might be quieted "by notice by publication to all persons." Even before the Torrens Law was adopted, the state had the power and right to provide a procedure for the adjudication of title to real estate. The state has control over the real property within its limits. The conditions of ownership of real estate within the state, whether the owner be a stranger or a citizen, is subject to its rules, concerning the holding, transfer, liability to obligations, private or public, and the modes of establishing title thereto, and for the purpose of determining these questions, it (the state) may provide any reasonable rules or procedure. The state possesses not only the right to determine how title to real estate may be acquired and proved, but it is also within its legislative capacity to establish the method of procedure.

6. ID.; ID.; ID.; ADJUDICATION OF TITLE. — The state, as sovereign over the land situated within it, may provide for the adjudication of title in a proceeding in rem or in the nature of a proceeds in rem, which shall be binding upon all persons, known or unknown.

7. ID.; ID.; ID.; SUBSTITUTED SERVICE. — If the state can provide for substituted service, for the purpose of quieting title to real estate against an unknown resident, it may provide a reasonable method for securing substituted service against residents. The power of the state to provide methods of quieting title to real estate should not be limited to known persons. In order to make such a law valuable and effective to its fullest extent; it is necessary that it be made to operate on all interests and all persons, known or unknown. If the procedure adopted for obtaining service does not satisfy the constitution, a judicial proceeding to clear title against all the world is hardly possible, for the very meaning of such proceeding is to get rid of unknown as well as known claimants. To deny this power of the state would be to deny its power to deal with titles to land and to quiet title thereto. The criterion is not the possibility of conceivable injury, but the just and reasonable character of the requirement, having reference to the subject with which the constitution deals.

8. ID.; LAND COURT; RIGHT TO CORRECT ERRORS OF CLOSURE OF PLAN. — The right of the land court to correct an error of closure, we believe is authorized and sustained by law, provided such correction does not include land not included in the original petition.

9. ID.; ID.; RIGHT TO CORRECT ERRORS IN ORIGINAL CERTIFICATE. — Section 112 of Act No. 496 provides that the registered owner may, at any time, apply by petition to have corrected any "error, omission, or mistake made in entering a certificate, or any memorandum thereon, or on any duplicate certificate." Under said provision the original certificate may be amended so as to include not only the land described in the original petition, but the buildings located thereon as well, which had also been included in the original petition.

It appears from the record that on the 12th day of January, 1906, the said petitioner, Maria del Consuelo Felisa Roxas y Chuidian, presented a petition in the Court of Land Registration for the purpose of having registered, under the Torrens system, four parcels of land, known as Parcel A, Parcel B, Parcel C, and Parcel D, all of which were located in the city of Manila. The only one of said parcels to which attention need be given in the present appeal is Parcel A.

From an examination of said petition we find that parcel A was described generally and technically.

"I. General description. — It is a parcel of land with the buildings erected thereon, located in the district of Binondo of this city between Nos. 84, 90, 92, 94, and 96 Calle Escolta and the northern bank of the Pasig River; bounded on the north by Calle Escolta for 31.08 meters, on the south by the Pasig River for 25.19 meters, on the east by the estate of Pedro P. Roxas for 66.48 meters, and on the west by the estate of the heirs of Antonio Enriquez for 62.10 meters, with an area of 1,817.03 square meters as set forth in the attached plan.

"II. Technical description. — The undersigned on the 26th of the present month proceeded to survey and fix the boundaries for preparing the topographical plan of a lot occupied by buildings of strong materials one and two stories high belonging to Maria del Consuelo Roxas y Chuidian, located in the district of Binondo of this city between Nos. 84, 90, 92, 94, and 96 Calle Escolta and the northern bank of the Pasig River. The point marked on the plan with the letter ’X,’ located at the vertex of the angle formed by the northeastern side of Calle Escolta and the corner of the Pasaje de Perez was selected as the basic point, whence S. 49