1850, January 28, the treasurer had received the sum of $2,203.94, and had paid out on bills approved by the president, $2,203.57, leaving a balance in the treasury of $0.37. Sundry assessments amounting in all to 75 per cent. upon the subscriptions, were afterwards voted, the last on the 6th of May, 1852. These assessments were rescinded by a vote passed July 23, 1858, and it also voted that the several amounts heretofore paid by individual stockholders, except on assessment laid April 11, 1849, be credited to their several accounts on assessments now or hereafter to be made. 1850, October 28, the contract with Messrs. Gilman and Carpenter, was ratified, and on the 29th, the president was authorized to execute it. The Committee have not found this contract nor any record stating its provisions. December 27, 1850, a committee reported that the whole amount of stock subscribed, was $250,800, of which $7,200 was payable in land damages and materials for the road; and that Messrs. Gilmore and Carpenter had subscribed for 500 shares of stock, to wit, $50,000. On the 7th day of January, 1851, the directors voted to break ground the next day, and on the 27th of May in the same year, they voted to expend a sum not exceeding $25,000, in experiments upon the east side of the mountain, at or near the mouth of the proposed tunnel. In 1851, the corporation petitioned the legislature for a loan of the State credit for two million dollars; but the application was unsuccessful. The failure to secure the aid of the Commonwealth, appears not to have discouraged the corporation, for on the 7th of August, 1851, the directors voted that they would proceed forthwith from Adams to the New York line, and simultaneously incur all the necessary expenses to make thorough experiments with such machines as promise to facilitate the construction of the tunnel, and when the road is begun from Greenfield, it shall be after an arrangement is made to construct it to the foot of the mountain in Florida and connect in some way with the road at North Adams.