railroad company would have purchased the property and erected on it a rolling mill. The courts were now appealed to, but a recital of the many suits and counter-suits between the government, the railroad company and the Adams company would be uninteresting and tiresome. The latter first tried to eject the railroad company and, failing in this, and finding that, as they never intended to establish manufacturing at the place, their enterprise was futile, they tried to return the property into the hands of the government on the pretense that they could not get possession of all they had bargained for. After a great deal of litigation the government, no doubt, thinking that the game was not worth the candle, as the saying is, finally cried "quits" and received back the property, without enforcing any pecuniary claim arising from the sale. All this time the people of Harper's Ferry were suffering from hope deferred and truly sick were their hearts. The magnificent water power was lying idle, as far as any general utilization of it was concerned, and so matters rested until the year 1886, when the property was purchased by Savery and Company, of Wilmington, Delaware, who, in the spring of 1887, proceeded to render the water power available for the purpose of pulp mills. These gentlemen encountered many difficulties arising from the indefinite wording of old deeds made to the government at various times and the conflicting claims of various property holders at the place. Their most serious difficulty was with the firm of Child, McCreight and Company, or rather with a new firm composed of some members of the original one and others taken from time to time into the company. In the summer of 1887 the United States Court at Parkersburg, West Virginia, decided in favor of Savery and Company, standing on the rights supposed to have been enjoyed by the government when the sale was made to these gentlemen. In the meantime, a pulp mill was erected on the Shenandoah, and, in some time after another on the Potomac. Savery and Company experienced difficulties with the Chesapeake and Ohio canal company also. The State of Maryland has always laid claim to jurisdiction over the Potomac, as far as the ordinary water mark on the Virginia shore and, as in times of drought, the volume of water in that river is but little more than is required for the supply of the canal, the State of Maryland, which owns a large interest in that work, when appealed to by the canal company, used all its power to hinder the water from being diverted to other industries than that of the canal which is under their direct patronage and protection. The author is not advised as to the result of this controversy, but both the pulp mills are in operation and that on the Potomac--the one to be affected by any victory for the canal company--is worked at present without any apparent interruption. The new firm--Savery and Company--are evidently good business men, and it would