Joe: your nice 1898 4E was originally fitted with either Chain or "Fine 3 Rod Damascus", or Nitro Steel (have you requested a Research Letter?). At some point it received a set of 1908 Armor Steel barrels from a 00E. Had the new barrels been fitted at Hunter Arms, they would have received the original SN. Replacement Nitro steel barrels would have cost about 1/2 of the full 4E price.
This unfortunately was a not uncommon scenario when the dangers of damascus became common knowledge in the 20s and 30s. That "common knowledge" was false knowledge however
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LFnSG34k3mBhLEjEgU267wAlIa215MNVQZhIiY62Hx4/edit