ART. 81] FAILURE TO MAKE RETURN—SAVING CLAUSE. 1877

1896, ch. 120, sec. 195.

204. If any person shall, with a view to evade the payment-
of taxes, fail or refuse to give in to the assessor any bonds,
notes, claims or other evidences of debt which are subject to
assessment and taxation under this article, the same shall not
be recoverable by action at law or suit in equity before any of
the courts of this State until they have been listed and the tax
paid thereon, with an addition of fifty per centum per annum
from the time the tax accrued, and the failure to give in said
bonds, notes, claims or other evidence of debt shall be taken as
prima fade evidence of the intention to so evade payment of
taxes.

Ibid. sec. 2.

205. This article shall not in any manner affect the gross
receipts taxes levied on corporations for the year eighteen
hundred and ninety-six or any preceding year or the valuation
of property made or existing for the purpose of State, county or
municipal taxation in the year- eighteen hundred and ninety-
six, or the collection of taxes levied thereon in said year or in
any preceding year, and such valuation and assessment for
said year eighteen hundred and ninety-six may be increased
or diminished and omitted property be valued and assessed to
the owner thereof during such year for such purposes under
the provisions of the general laws of this State in force on the
first day of January, eighteen hundred and ninety-six; pro-
vided, however, that nothing in this article contained shall be
construed to repeal, alter or affect the provisions of section 4
of article 4 of the public local laws of Baltimore city, in so far
as the same relate to the mode and measure of assessing and
taxing the real and personal property within the present limits
of the territory annexed to Baltimore city under the annexa-
tion act of 1888, chapter 98, for city purposes; and provided
further, however, that nothing in this article contained shall
be held to discharge or release, impair or affect any irrepeal-
able contract or obligation of any kind whatsoever existing on
the 30th day of March, 1896, or to affect or to apply to any
pending civil suit, action or proceeding, or to any pending
prosecution for a crime or misdemeanor, or to prevent the
prosecution and punishment hereafter of any offense already
committed, or that may be hereafter committed, against the
provisions, or any of them, of article 81 of the Code of Public
General Laws, title "Revenue and Taxes," as the same existed
on the said 30th day of March, 1896, and wherever the words