ART. 81] FAILURE TO MAKE RETURN——SAVING CLAUSE. 1891

under this article, the same shall not be recoverable by action at law
or suit in equity before any of the courts of this State until they have
been listed and the tax paid thereon, with an addition of fifty per
centum per annum from the time the tax accrued, and the failure to
give in said bonds, notes, claims or other evidence of debt shall be
taken as prima facie evidence of the intention to so evade payment of

taxes.*

1904, art. 81. sec. 205. 1896, ch. 120. sec. 2.

209. This article shall not in any manner affect the gross receipts
taxes levied on corporations for the year eighteen hundred and ninety-
six or any preceding year or the valuation of property made or existing
for the purpose of State, county or municipal taxation in the year
eighteen hundred and ninety-six, or the collection of taxes levied
thereon in said year or in any preceding year, and such valuation and
assessment for said year eighteen hundred and ninety-six may be
increased or diminished and omitted property be valued and assessed
to the owner thereof during such year for such purposes under the pro-
visions of the general laws of this State in force on the first day of
January, eighteen hundred and ninety-six; provided, however, that
nothing in this article contained shall be construed to repeal, alter or
affect the provisions of section 4 of article 4 of the public local laws of
Baltimore city, in so far as the same relate to the mode and measure of
assessing and taxing the real and personal property within the present
limits of the territory annexed to Baltimore city under the annexation
act of 1888, chapter 98, for city purposes; and provided further, how-
ever, that nothing in this article contained shall be held to discharge
or release, impair or affect any irrepealable contract or obligation of
any kind whatsoever existing on the 30th day of March, 1896, or to
affect or to apply to any pending civil suit, action, or proceeding, or to
any pending prosecution for a crime or misdemeanor, or to prevent the
prosecution and punishment hereafter of any offense already com-
mitted, or that may be hereafter committed, against the provisions,
or any of them, of article 81 of the Code of Public General Laws, title
"Revenue and Taxes," as the same existed on the said 30th day of
March, 1896, and wherever the words "City Court of Baltimore" occur
in this article they shall be construed to mean the Baltimore city court.+
This section strongly indicates the intention that all existing contracts
and obligations which were not irrepealable were to yield to the provisions
of the act of 1896, ch. 120, so far as inconsistent with the latter. B., C. &
A. Ry. Co. v. Wicomico County, 103 Md. 292; Wicomico County v' Ban-
croft, 203 U. S. 112.

*This section is identical with section 28 of the act of 1910, ch. 300 (p. 251).
providing for a re-assessment in all of the counties of the state except two—see
foot-note to section 202.

+ This section is in part identical with section 29 of the act of 1910, ch. 300
(p. 261), providing for a re-assessment in all of the counties except two—see
foot-note to section 202.

Section 196 as enacted by the act of 1890, ch. 141, was omitted from the code
of 1904 because fully executed in 1896; and by some error in numbering the
sections added to the general assessment act of 1896, ch. 120, by the supple-
mental acts of 1896, chapters 140, 142 and 143, no section numbered 197 was
enacted at all.