there three or four minutes and then left. We asked the clerk in charge of the office there for the plans of the various buildings to be wrecked. He handed us two sets of plans--one for the Agricultural and one for the Horticultural Building. We requested more plans of him, but he said he was too busy to take them down and immediately left the room and remained out all the time we were in there. We went to the shelves and took out the plans ourselves and looked them over. After we had looked over the plans for a couple of hours we went out on the exposition grounds, and spent the rest of that day and the next on the grounds, and on the following day we returned to Chicago. The bids were to be in Mr. Taylor's office by 12 o'clock noon Thursday, November 10, 1904. Mr. Schmitt, my bookkeeper, and myself went to St. Louis on November 9 and were present at Mr. Taylor's office in the Administration Building before the hour of 12 o'clock noon, November 10. I had prepared my bid. At this time I only bid on the stock barns, live-stock forum, Congress Hall, Agricultural and Horticultural buildings. I also had a separate bid prepared for the Transportation Building, which I submitted. I took my bids and handed them to Mr. Carl Hoblitzelle, Mr. Taylor's private secretary. He placed them in his desk and said he would bring them to the attention of the committee when the time came to open the bids. Mr. Schmitt and I then went into an anteroom, where the other bidders were gathered. There were present at the time Mr. H.S. Albrecht, of the firm of Schoellhorn & Albrecht, St. Louis; Mr. Charles McDonald, of the St. Louis Steam Forge Company, St. Louis; Mr. W. Ware, of the Columbia Wrecking Company, St. Louis; a Mr. Schaeffer and son, of St. Louis, and Mr. Frank and Abraham Harris, who represented the Chicago House Wrecking Company. There were one or two other gentlemen present, but I can not now recall their names. Some middle-aged man came in with the Harris Brothers. He seemed to have free access to the room where the salvage committee was in session, and ran back and forth two or three times and held a conversation with the Harris Brothers in the hall. We expected the bids to be opened at 1 o'clock. It was now some time after 1 o'clock. We were all waiting there when President Francis came in and announced that they were going to lunch, and for us to come back later on. We all left the room and I with several other gentlemen went to get a little lunch. We were back in the anteroom of Mr. Taylor's office by 2.30 p. in. We waited there until 4 o'clock when Mr. Taylor's secretary came into the room and requested all the bidders to go into the room where the salvage committee was in session. The committee met in Mr. Taylor's office. President Francis, Mr. Taylor, Samuel Kennard, Mr. Holmes, and some other gentleman, I can not call his name now. President Francis arose and said: "Gentlemen, the bids are all there on the table