1876.] OF THE SENATE. 929

required, in the name and behalf of the State, upon the
recommendation of the County Commissioners of said county
making such application, to subscribe for so many shares of
the capital stock of the Company as shall amount to the
sum, which, by this Act, is distributed and applied to said
county."

So that the County Commissioners had a right to presume
that the State Treasurer would require satisfactory evidence,
that bona fide subscriptions, equal to the proposed State's sub-
scription, should be made by others before he would sub-
scribe in the name and behalf of the State.

Was the proper proof required by the State Treasurer ? It
appears from the papers on file in the office of the Treasurer
of the State, that an affidavit was filed with the Treasurer on
the 22d day of October, 1872, dated October 19th, 1872, and
sworn to by Samuel S. Smoot, President of the Southern
Maryland Railroad Company, to the effect ''that bona fide
subscriptions to the capital stock of the Southern Maryland
Railroad Company, equal in amount to the sum authorized
by said Act, has been made in money, and that the said
Company is entitled to the benefits of said Act as soon as the;
recommendation of the Commissioners of St. Mary's county
to that effect shah be filed in the office of the said Treasu-
rer." On the 30th day of January, 1873, the State Treasu-
rer subscribed for 1,630 shares of the capital stock of the
Southern Maryland Railroad Company of the par value of
$100 per share, amounting in the aggregate to the sum of
$163,000 upon the faith of this affidavit. No other proof of
any kind seems to have been required by the State Treasurer
The undersigned find that the officers of the Company have
failed to show that this affidavit was true, and are of the can-
did opinion, from the testimony taken before the Committee,
that said affidavit was not true. The Committee having re-
fused to common Mr. John W. Davis, (at the time of the
transaction the Treasurer of the State ) the undersigned are
unable to say what representations, it any, were made to him
other than those contained in the said affidavit; they feel it
their duty, however, to say that if no other proof was re-
quired, the Treasurer either failed to extrcise that careful
supervision which the magnitude of the transaction called
for, or else misconstrued the Act of 1868, chap. 454.

In relation to the warrants issued by the Comptroller, and
the payments made by the Treasurer of the State to the va-
rious assignees of the Southern Maryland Railroad Company,
the undersigned must report that the provisions of the Act
of 1868, chapter 454, are so plain as to leave no doubt in
their minds but that said warrants have been issued and paid