the amount was sent to the bankers of the company. The committee of the company, however, informed him that they could give him no relief, as they had acted according to the laws of the company, from which no deviation could be made. The plaintiff thereupon filed a bill for relief against the forfeiture, on the grounds of accident, and that compensation might be made, and no injury be sustained by the company; his counsel also insisting upon the invalidity of the by-law, as unreasonable, exorbitant, and uncertain: but the court dismissed the bill, for the reason that the enterprise was a public undertaking, requiring for its successful prosecution punctuality of payment from the shareholders. Considerations of public policy forbade the granting of relief; for, as the court observed, "if this species of equity is open to the parties engaged in these undertakings, they could not be carried on."

The act of March 10, 1862, is a clear assertion of forfeiture of the estate, rights, privileges, and franchises of the Minnesota and Pacific Railroad Company. It grants all of them in express terms to the new company, and makes them in its possession subject to be forfeited to the State if the conditions annexed are not performed. And the failure of the original company to complete any portion of the road, as provided in the amendment of 1858, is not questioned by the complainants. Their position is, that the State had previously lost the right to a forfeiture by her own breaches of the amendment; that forfeiture could not be effected without judicial process and judgment; and that the forfeiture, if any accrued, was waived by the act of March 8, 1861, and its acceptance by the company.

The alleged breaches of the amendment by the State, at least such as are entitled to notice, consist in the refusal of the governor to receive the bonds of the company secured by the trustdeed of July 31, 1858, as the first-mortgage bonds required to be delivered to the treasurer in exchange for the State bonds, the exaction of the supplemental trust-deed, and the adoption of the constitutional amendment of November, 1860, abrogating the amendment of 1858, and prohibiting any law which levied a tax or made other provisions for the payment of the bonds of the State from taking effect until submitted to a vote of the people and adopted.

The amendment of 1858 evidently contemplated that the first-mortgage bonds of the company delivered to the treasurer in exchange for State bonds should be secured by a separate deed of trust, or at least by a deed which could be enforced by the governor, and not by a deed executed to parties over whom he could exercise no control. Whether the supplemental deed of trust was a sufficient compliance with the provision of the amendment, and whether it could create a priority of lien in favor of the bonds transferred to the State over bonds previously issued by the company to other creditors, it is unneces sary to determine. If defective or inoperative in either of these particulars, the objection cannot be raised by the company. Besides, if it could be considered as a matter of serious doubt whether the State was entitled to require a separate instrument of the character executed, its voluntary execution and acceptance by the governor and the subsequent exchange of bonds would seem to be a settlement of the question.

The adoption of the constitutional amendment of November, 1860, certainly had the effect to impair the value of the bonds of the State. But it is the holders of those bonds who had a right to complain of this proceeding, not the company or the trustees under the deed in suit. The holders of those bonds looked, in the first instance, to the State for their payment: the State was primarily liable to them; and they were, therefore, injuriously affected by the amendment. Whether the company was liable at all to the bondholders on the bonds from the indorsement of its president, it is unnecessary to determine: but, assuming such liability, then, as between the company and the State, the company was the principal debtor, and the State only a surety; and, with that relation existing, the company could not complain that the State, its surety, did not pay the bonds, interest or principal. And the trustees could not complain; for no right or contract between them and the company, or between them and the State, was impaired by the proceeding.

The amendment of 1858 prohibited any further issue of State bonds, whenever the company made default in meeting the interest on those issued. The withholding, therefore, of any further bonds, after such default, violated no contract of the State with the company; nor did it impair the right of the

State to enforce a forfeiture of its grant if the stipulated conditions as to the completion of the road were not complied with. After such default (no redemption from it having been made), all obligation of the State to the company ceased: its obligation remained only to its bondholders. That obligation still remains, and will remain until the pledge of its faith for the payment of the bonds is redeemed.

As to the alleged waiver of the forfeiture by the act of March 8, 1861, and its acceptance by the company, only a word need be said. The waiver, if the provisions of the act can be construed as such, was only conditional; and the condition was not complied with. There had previously been, as already stated, a foreclosure and sale of the property, rights, and franchises of the company under its supplemental deed of trust, pursuant to the act of the legislature of the previous year; and, at the sale, the State had become the purchaser. The act of March 8, 1861, released and restored to the company the road, lands, rights, and franchises which it had possessed previous to the sale, and all bonds and securities of the company held by the State, free from all liens or claims thereon. The release and restoration were upon express conditions, one of which was that the company would construct and put into operation before the following January a designated portion of its road; and the act declared, that, upon the default of the company in this respect, all the rights and benefits conferred by virtue of the act should be "forfeited to the State absolutely, and without any further act or ceremony whatever," to be held by the State "without merger or extinguishment, to be used, granted, or disposed of, for the purpose of aiding and facilitating the construction of said road and branch." The designated portion of the road was not constructed within the prescribed period, and never has been constructed; and it was with reference to the forfeiture provided for its default in this respect, as well as the forfeiture provided by the amendment. of 1858, that the act of March 10, 1862, was passed. That act operated to divest the company of all interest in the one hundred and twenty sections of land and connected franchises transferred to it by the Territory in 1857, or subsequently acquired. It follows from these views that the court below properly sustained the demurrer to the bill. Decree affirmed.

SHUEY, EXECUTOR, v. UNITED STATES.

1. Where a "liberal reward" was offered for information leading to the apprehension of a fugitive from justice, and a specific sum for his apprehension, — Held, that a party giving the information which led to the arrest was entitled to the "liberal reward," but not to the specific sum, unless he, in fact, apprehended the fugitive, or the arrest was made by his agents.

2. Where the offer of a reward is made by public proclamation, it may, before rights have accrued under it, be withdrawn through the same channel in which it was made. No contract arises under such offer until its terms are complied with. The fact that the claimant of such reward was ignorant of its withdrawal is immaterial.

APPEAL from the Court of Claims.

Henry B. Ste. Marie filed his petition in the Court of Claims to recover the sum of $15,000, being the balance alleged to be due him of the reward of $25,000 offered by the Secretary of War, on the 20th of April, 1865, for the apprehension of John H. Surratt, one of Booth's alleged accomplices in the murder of President Lincoln.

The court below found the facts as follows:

1. On the 20th April, 1865, the Secretary of War issued, and caused to be published in the public newspapers and otherwise, a proclamation, whereby he announced that there would be paid by the War Department "for the apprehension of John H. Surratt, one of Booth's accomplices," $25,000 reward, and also that "liberal rewards will be paid for any information that shall conduce to the arrest of either of the above-named criminals or their accomplices ;" and such proclamation was not limited in terms to any specific period, and it was signed "Edwin M. Stanton, Secretary of War." On the 24th November, 1865, the President caused to be published his order revoking the reward offered for the arrest of John H. Surratt. 13 Stat. 778.

2. In April, 1866, John H. Surratt was a zouave in the military service of the Papal government, and the claimant was also a zouave in the same service. During that month he cornmunicated to Mr. King, the American minister at Rome, the fact that he had discovered and identified Surratt, who had confessed to him his participation in the plot against the life of President Lincoln. The claimant also subsequently commu

nicated further information to the same effect, and kept watch, at the request of the American minister, over Surratt. Thereupon certain diplomatic correspondence passed between the government of the United States and the Papal government relative to the arrest and extradition of Surratt; and on the 6th November, 1866, the Papal government, at the request of the United States, ordered the arrest of Surratt, and that he be brought to Rome, he then being at Veroli. Under this order of the Papal government, Surratt was arrested; but, at the moment of leaving prison at Veroli, he escaped from the guard having him in custody, and, crossing the frontier of the Papal territory, embarked at Naples, and escaped to Alexandria in Egypt. Immediately after his escape, and both before and after his embarkation at Naples, the American minister at Rome, being informed of the escape by the Papal government, took measures to trace and rearrest him, which was done in Alexandria. From that place he was subsequently conveyed by the American government to the United States; but the American minister, having previously procured the discharge of the claimant from the Papal military service, sent him forward to Alexandria to identify Surratt. At the time of the first interview between the claimant and the American minister, and at all subsequent times until the final capture of Surratt, they were ignorant of the fact that the reward offered by the Secretary of War for his arrest had been revoked by the President. The discovery and arrest of Surratt were due entirely to the disclosures made by the claimant to the American minister at Rome; but the arrest was not made by the claimant, either at Veroli, or subsequently at Alexandria.

3. There has been paid to the claimant by the defendants, under the act of 27th July, 1868 (15 Stat. 234, sect. 3), the sum of $10,000. Such payment was made by a draft on the treasury payable to the order of the claimant, which draft was by him duly indorsed.

The court found as a matter of law that the claimant's service, as set forth in the foregoing findings, did not constitute an arrest of Surratt within the meaning of the proclamation, but was merely the giving of information which conduced to the arrest. For such information the remuneration allowed to him