MARYLAND GEOLOGICAL SURVEY                         445

of the enlargement of Kent County here mentioned, but it seems proba-
ble that the area was only that about the settlements between Swan's
Point and Langford Bay.

After the separation of Cecil County in 1674 the county seat of Bal-
timore County was established on Bush River at old Baltimore Town,
where it remained until 1712, when it was removed to Joppa, whence it
was again removed in 1768 to the present Baltimore City. The gradual
change to the westward of the county seat was the result of the increas-
ing population along the Patapsco River, and northward from the Bay
shore until at the last date given the populations of the upper and lower
portions of Baltimore County were approximately equal. The removal
of the county seat occasioned considerable feeling between the two por-
tions of the county. The inhabitants of the upper or eastern portion
soon expressed a desire for a separation from their successful rivals
on the west. Accordingly in 1773 the General Assembly passed an Act
decreeing

" that after the second of March next all that part of Baltimore county
which is included within the bounds following, to wit: Beginning at the
mouth of the little falls of the Gunpowder river, and running with the said
falls to the fountain head, and from thence north to the temporary line of
this province, and thence with the temporary line to the Susequehanna river,
thence with Susquehanna to Chesapeake bay, and thence with the said bay,
including Spesitic and Pool's islands, to the mouth of Gunpowder river to the
beginning aforesaid shall be and is hereby erected into a new county, by the
name of Harford county."

The introduction of the " temporary line " as a term in the boundary
of the newly erected county is a curious anachronism. The " temporary
line " was a line run ex parte by the Pennsylvanians in 1739, and was
the only boundary recognized between Maryland and Pennsylvania on
the west side of the Susquehanna from the date of its location until the
work of Mason and Dixon. At the time when the law erecting Harford
County was enacted, however, the work of Mason and Dixon had been
completed, the present boundary line run and the well-known stones set
in position, the surveyors having completed their allotted work five
years before. Moreover, their work had been accepted by the proprietors
of Pennsylvania and Maryland and approved by the Lord High Chan-