1772 PUBLIC WORKS—BOARD OF. [ART. 78A

general shall approve they shall transfer to the purchaser or
purchasers the interest so sold to him or them, but if the
highest price or prices shall in their judgment be insufficient
they shall have power and it shall be their duty to reject said
bid or bids.

1892, ch. 310, sec. 2. 1896, ch. 172.

8. The board of public works are hereby authorized and
directed, whenever they shall determine it to be for the best
interest of the State to sell the whole or any part of the follow-
ing State stocks and securities, to wit: Fifty-five hundred
shares of the capital stock of the Washington branch of the
Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company; six hundred shares
of the capital stock of the Annapolis Water Company; fifteen
hundred and forty-nine shares of the capital stock of the
Farmers' National Bank of Annapolis; all now held and owned
by the State of Maryland. And in making sale of such stock
or securities the said board of public works are directed to
proceed as directed in the preceding section. But the said
board of public works may exchange any of the said State
securities at their actual market value, for an equal amount of
the outstanding bonds or certificates of indebtedness of the
State, and full authority is hereby given them to execute and
deliver such transfers or assignments as may be necessary to
effect such sale, exchange or transfer. And whenever there
shall be any sale or transfer of such State securities by the
board of public works, the proceeds thereof shall be applied
to the payment and cancellation of a like amount of the out-
standing bonds or certificates of debt of the State. And when-
ever any of the outstanding bonds or certificates' of debt of the
State shall be paid, the same shall be cancelled and entered by
designation and number by the treasurer, in the book in his
office known as the "treasurer's record of bonds paid and can-
celled." And the treasurer and 'Comptroller are hereby directed,
during the month of September, and prior to the close of the
fiscal year next preceding the meeting of the general assembly,
to charge off on their books of account all such State bonds
and certificates of debt which have been paid or redeemed, so
as to reduce the accounts of such bonds and certificates of debt
to the amounts then actually outstanding and unpaid,.so that
the said books, at the time the comptroller's report is made,
will show the actual outstanding debt of the State. And the
treasurer shall report the same to the next succeeding general
assembly, fully and in detail. And the committee of finance