930 JOURNAL OF PROCEEDINGS [Apl. 3,

without compliance with the provisions of said Act either by
the Company or by the Comptroller of the Treasury.

The subscription having been made by the Treasurer of the
State, as above recited, the State became a stockholder in the
Company, with the obligations and the same rights as any
other stockholder, except that the Act of 1868 threw addi-
tional safeguards around the the State's subscription. The
State could not be required, at any time, to pay any more per
share on its subscription than any other stockholder. The
Company could not assess the State on its subscription, any
greater installments per share, than the assessment per share
on the other stockholders. The assessments must be equal.
And yet, it appears from the testimony that the State has
paid 100 per cent, in money, whilst the private stockholders,
if any there be. have paid little, if anything, and never
claimed to have paid more than 50 per centum. From all the
evidence the Committee could find in the office of the Comp-
troller and State Treasurer, it appears, that on the 3d day of
February, 1873, the County Commissioners of St. Mary's
county passed a resolution, by which the Treasurer of the
State was recommended "to pay over to the Southern Mary-
land Railroad Company the first and second installments now
due, on each share of the capital stock of said Company, here-
tofore subscribed by the said Treasurer, in the name and be-
half of the State of Maryland, as recommended by this Board,
by its order of the 3d day of January, 1873, the amount of
said installments being 50 per centum on each share as sub-
scribed as aforesaid." On the 5th day of February, 1873,
two days after the passage of this resolution, the same was
filed with the State Treasurer, together with an affidavit of
the 5th of February, 1873, sworn to by Samuel S. Smoot,
President, Hamilton G. Fant, Treasurer, to the effect, "that
50 per centum on each share of the capital stock of the said
Southern Maryland Railroad Company has been duly paid to
the Treasurer of said Company, in two separate install-
ments." These installments are stated by Sinoot in his testi-
mony., to have been the installment of 2 per cent. ($20,000)
required to be paid at the time of the original subscription in
1868, and an additional installment of 48 per cent., which
Smoot and Fant claim to have paid by a bogus certificate of
deposit, of which we will speak hereafter. The above resolu-
tion of the County Commissioners, and the affidavit were filed
with the State Treasurer on the 5th day of February, 1873,
together with a letter from Smoot to the State Treasurer, in
which the latter was requested as follows : "Should these
papers be sufficient, please have a warrant issued for the
amount, and if the Treasury is not in funds, please write me