UNITED STATES. 3019

light, range-light, light-keeper's dwelling, forts, magazines, arsenals, dock-
yards, buoys, public piers, or necessary public buildings or improvements
connected therewith, and cannot agree with the owner thereof as to the
price and for the purchase thereof; or if the owner be feme covert, under
age, non compos mentis, or out of the county wherein the said land lies, or
for any other cause is incapable of making a perfect title to said lands, the
United States, by any agent authorized under the hand and seal of any
member of the president's cabinet, may apply by petition in writing to
the circuit court for the county where the land lies; which petition shall
be filed with the clerk of said court, to have the said land condemned for
the use and benefit of the United States; and any such agent of the United
States may, for the purpose of ascertaining its bounds and quantity, enter
upon the lands, without injury thereto, which the United States may desire
to purchase for any of the purposes aforesaid.

An. Code, sec. 6. 1904, sec. 6. 1888, sec. 6. 1874, ch. 395, sec. 2.

6. Said petition shall state the bounds and quantity of the land to
which the United States desire to obtain title and the public purposes for
which said land is desired; and the names of the owner or owners thereof,
and where they respectively reside, and whether they are adults or under
age, and whether married or single, or non compos mentis; if said facts are
known to the agent filing said petition, or if said agent does not know any
fact which he is hereinbefore required, if known to him, to state, he shall
state in said petition that he does not know said fact.

An. Code, sec. 7. 1904, sec. 7. 1888, sec. 7. 1874, ch. 395, sec. 3.

7. Every such petition must be verified by an affidavit to be taken
before the clerk of said court, and annexed thereto, of the said agent of the
United States, that the statements therein contained are true to the best of
his knowledge and belief; and where said petition shall state that it is
unknown where any such owner resides or whether he is an adult or under
age, married, single, or non compos mentis, the said agent shall further
make affidavit that he has used all reasonable efforts to ascertain the fact
or facts stated in said petition to be unknown by him, and has failed to
ascertain them.

An. Code, sec. 8. 1904. sec. 8. 1888, sec. 8. 1874, ch. 395, sec. 4.

8. Upon the said petition, verified as aforesaid, being filed in the office
of said clerk, it shall be the duty of said clerk to give notice of the substance
and object of said petition by printed notice, to be published once a week
for three months in some newspaper printed in the city of Baltimore, and
also by like notice, to be published as aforesaid, in one newspaper printed
and published in the county where the land lies, if any newspaper be so
printed and published; such notice shall contain an accurate description
of the land to which the United States desire to obtain title, and shall state
the names of the owners or supposed owners thereof, and the place or
supposed places of their residence, or that said places are unknown, and
whether said owners or any of them are feme covert, under age, or non