1860.

LAWS OF MARYLAND.

CHAP. 365.

always to be first reduced or wholly cancelled be-
fore any previous annual issue is at all reduced,
and all the issues of scrip to be liable to reduction
and cancellation before the capital stock shall be
encroached upon; the board of directors shall have
full power to reduce and cancel the scrip of said
company for the purpose and in the succession
aforesaid, as the exigencies of the company may
require.

Capital.

ART. 9. No scrip issued by the company shall be
paid off in whole or in part so as to reduce the ag-
gregate of the capital, and the surplus or reserved
fund aforesaid, below the sum of two hundred and
fifty thousand dollars, but the capital shall not be
regarded as unpaired, unless the amount of stock
capital, created by or under the second article of
this charter, is deficient by losses or otherwise; in
case of such deficiency the board of directors shall
have power to levy an assessment on the shares to
make up the deficiency, and after public notice is
given in two of the daily papers of the city of Bal-
timore, for at least thirty days, of such assessment,
and requiring its payment, the directors may sell
at auction the stock of any shareholder, who shall
neglect or refuse to pay such assessment within one
week from the time at which such payment is in,
and by said public notice required; Provided, a
price equal to the assessment be realized for it, and
a new certificate shall be issued to the purchaser
for the share or shares so purchased, and the old
one shall be cancelled in the books of the company,
and any surplus received for the stock so sold over
and above the assessment and expense shall be paid
over to the holder of such cancelled certificate.

Power of di-
rectors.

ART. 10. The directors may, at any time, by a
vote of two-thirds of their whole number, convert
the issue of scrip at its then marketable value into
capital stock, and make the company wholly a capi-
tal stock company, or when the surplus or reserved
fund, represented by the scrip aforesaid, shall
amount to a sum equal to the original capital stock
of two hundred and fifty thousand dollars, they
may refund the capital stock at such value as it
may then bear in the market, not less than par,
and make it wholly a mutual company, and the
directors shall also have power to make all neces-
sary by-laws to conform to such changes in the