wheat stood in the foreground, and in the background could
be seen a ship approaching shore, with fore and main top-sails
set, the other sails furled. At the base was a cornucopia.
On the circle about this side were the words: " Industry the
means and plenty the result."

THE EIGHTH SEAL.

On March 4, 1817, the Council adopted a new seal. The
device was ordered to be the coat-of-arms of the United
States, surrounded with the words "Seal of the State of
Maryland."

THE NINTH SEAL.

The seal of 1817 remained the seal of the State until 1854,
when the apparatus, called the "Great Seal," had become so
worn that a new one had to be made. Governor Enoch Louis
Lowe called attention to the inappropriateness of the State
seal, and he suggested that the new seal bear the arms of the
State. The legislature of that year ordered a new seal.
There was no longer a Governor's Council in existence to
make and unmake seals. The legislature intended to return
to the old seal of the Province. In the preparation of the
seal it had evidently recourse to a rough wood-cut, printed
on the title page of Bacon's Laws of Maryland, 1765, and
some errors contained in it were reproduced. One of the
officers of State, for political reasons, still further mutilated
the seal by patting an American eagle on the device in place
of the ancient crest.

THE TENTH AND PRESENT SEAL.

The attention of the Legislature of 1874 having been
attracted to the errors in the Great Seal, a joint resolution
was adopted looking to their correction. Reference having
been made to Bacon's wood-cat as the model of the new seal,
Governor James Black Groome determined not to take any
action, and thereby prevent the perpetuation of the errors
sought to be corrected. He brought the matter to the notice
of the Legislature of 1876. A carefully prepared resolution
was then adopted, restoring the seal to the exact description
given of it in Lord Baltimore's Commission to Governor
Stone, on August 12, 1648, and this is the Great Seal of
Maryland to-day.

The Great Seal is in the custody of the Secretary of State,
but the Governor has the control and use of it whenever
necessary for any purpose provided for by the Constitution
and laws, or when needed to authenticate communications