500                           THE COUNTIES OF MARYLAND

to the Mason and Dixon line, which was intersected on Little Savage
Mountain 4307 feet west of Big Savage Mountain, the point called for
in the Act erecting the county. This line was marked by blazed trees
and has been known as the old or Chisolm line. Six years later John
Harned, County Surveyor of Garrett County, using similar methods,
attempted to determine the true location of the line. Unlike his prede-
cessor, he started at the summit of Big Savage Mountain and ran south-
ward hoping to intersect the Potomac River at the mouth of Savage River,
but his line reached the Potomac near Westernport. Neither line con-
formed to the demands of the original Act. Accordingly an Act was
passed by the General Assembly in 1898 authorizing the Governor to pro-
cure a surveyor to run the line defined by the original Act. In accordance
with this enactment a new line was run by L. A. Bauer, acting for the
Maryland Geological Survey who was assisted in his work by surveyors
representing Allegany and Garrett counties. The method employed was
that of triangulation with all the refinements commanded by modern geo-
detic practice. The line finally marked was a straight line intersecting
the two terminal points as required by the law.

Subsequent to the running of the Brown-Bauer line its validity was
questioned. An Act was passed by the Legislature of 1906 to the effect
that the inhabitants living west of the line should vote upon its accept-
ance or non-acceptance. Since the Act did not specify the places where
the inhabitants of the disputed territory should vote when transferred
the validity of the line is still in question. Thus the eastern boundary of
Garrett County is neither a straight line as called for by the original Act
nor a crooked line connecting the two terminal points as originally defined.

The western boundary of Garrett County is also in dispute due to the
fact that it is at the same time the western boundary of Maryland.
According to the original charter to Lord Baltimore granted in 1632 the
western limit of Maryland was to be a line running due north from the
first fountain of the Potomac. When the region was a wilderness and
but little known it was supposed that the head of the North Branch of
the Potomac was situated at the Fairfax Stone and lines have accord-
ingly been drawn north from this point which have served as the western