Other decisions reach the same result on the principle of implied reservation against the riparian grantee, holding that his title remains subject to the state's paramount authority over navigation.

—subject to the right of the sovereign to make public improvements upon tidewater for the benefit of commerce

Prior to the court of appeals' decision in Dolphin Lane, courts in New York had been defining the "high water line" formulation according to the tides rather than by references to vegetation.

A first premise for the analysis of this case is that this Court has long held that grants by the State to private owners of land under navigable-in-fact rivers remain subject to an implied, reserved public easement of navigation

The government is said to reserve the right to improve the waters for the benefit of commerce and navigation.

"When lands are described in a deed as bounded by a navigable river where the tide ebbs and flows, the title ends at high-water mark

The subsequent grants of the tideway and lands under water to the city of New York had and could have no effect upon the riparian rights of the grantees in the Nichols patent.

In the absence of language clearly indicating a different intent, grants of land bounded by the sea or a navigable river where the tide ebbs and flows carry the title only to high-water mark

The control of navigable waters, if alienable at all, should only be so by an instrument showing a clear and undoubted intention on the part of the legislature to that end

Indeed, it is established that an appurtenance clause is insufficient to demonstrate a sovereign's intent to convey the underwater lands of a bounding watercourse