Lange

Petitioners are two of the defendants in • an action pending in said superior court in which the Vallejo. Ferry Company (a corporation) is plaintiff.

In the complaint the said corporation, among other things,, alleged “that on the eighteenth day of March, 1896, the city of Vallejo by Ordinance No. 132 of ordinances of said city” (a copy of the ordinance being set out in the complaint) “inconsideration of the sum of $10,151 paid said city of Vallejo by one William Whitney, duly granted, sold and conveyed to said William Whitney and to his assigns, the franchise, right, privilege and authority to construct, keep and take tolls upon a public ferry running between said city of Vallejo- and the United States Navy Yard at Mare Island for the term of twenty years from said date, which said ordinance and grant of franchise has ever since March 18, 1896, been, and' now is, in full force and effect. That on or about the twenty-eighth day of March, 1896, said William Whitney duly granted, bargained, sold and conveyed said ferry franchise- and all his rights under said franchise and ordinance to the-Vallejo Ferry Company, plaintiff herein, and plaintiff ever since March 28, 1896, has been…