ROOMS OF THE MARYLAND HISTORICAL SOCIETY,

BALTIMORE, November 12, 1883.
To THE HONORABLE.

THE SENATE AND HOUSE OF DELEGATES OF THE STATE OF MARYLAND:

Gentlemen:—At a meeting of the Maryland Historical Society, held
on the 12th of November, 1883, the Committee to which the custody of
the Archives of the State had been confided, reported as follows:

To the Maryland Historical Society :
Gentlemen:

The Committee appointed by you at the last Annual Meeting of the
Society to take charge of the Archives, then recently deposited by the
State, has much pleasure in handing you, and through you to the Gen-
eral Assembly of Maryland, the first volume of its labors, and with the
volume the following

REPORT.

Many reports have been made to the State concerning the Archives,
both by Committees and individuals appointed by the General Assem-
bly. With but few exceptions these reports were directed more to the
manner in which the Archives were cared for than to the Archives
themselves. The first full report seems to have been that of the Com-
mission appointed in 1722. They kept a record and made a tolerably
full report to the Assembly; it referred particularly to the condition of
the Land Records, the judicial and Testamentary Proceedings, Such
of the volumes as needed it were repaired, others lacked indices which
were supplied, and many needed copying to save their contents. Four
of the volumes copied by their order are now in our possession. In
1776 a Committee of the Council of Safety made a voluminous re-
port. In both these reports only bound books were noted. Coming
down to our own times, Mr. David Ridgely, in 1835, being then
the Librarian of the State, was directed by the Assembly to examine
the various offices and report upon the State Papers in them. The
result of his examination was printed in 1835. So far as the bound