Sale of B & O Telegraph Company terminated

The Baltimore & Ohio "Deal,"

The following is a letter written by Mr. Robert Garrett on July 20 to Mr. W. M. Singerly, the editor of the Philadelphia Record. It is the finale of .the long continued negotiations over what has been known as the "B. & O. deal:"

"DEAR SIR: In reply to your courteous inquiry as to the real status of the negotiations called by the press, 'The Baltimore & Ohio deal,' I beg to say that all such negotiations are terminated. The syndicate which was to acquire a large block of stock of the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company in such a way as was believed would be beneficial to all parties and railroads concerned, did not at the appointed time comply with their engagements and all arrangements or negotiations with them are now absolutely at an end.

"I have not purchased stock of the Johns Hopkins University, as stated in some of the newspapers. I had the option on that stock and also upon that of several other holders, but I have not exercised these options, nor do I intend now to do so. The statement in some of the papers that I purchased large blocks of Baltimore & Ohio stock is a mistake. As I have stated, I had options, but circumstances rendered it unnecessary to close them. The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad Company, its properties, including its 'large telegraph system and the ownership of its stock, remain now as they were at the opening of the negotiations. The wide-spread public interest which these negotiations have created and the many false and foolish rumors to which they have given rise, justifies me in departing from my usual course in making this formal statement of their final termination. Thanking you for the kindly terms in which you have been pleased to refer to the Baltimore & Ohio company and its future, and acknowledging the correctness of your judgment and that of many other friends as to the propriety of making public this letter, I am, as ever,

Yours very truly,

"ROBERT GARRETT."

It is probable that the close of the negotiations will be followed by litigation, suits being now threatened by Mr. Henry Ives, who was to have secured the property, and, it is alleged, to have turned the telegraph service over to the Western Union Company. In some quarters it is believed that negotiations are now going on again in another shape.