ing on pivots. To the shorter end of each is attached a punch, while the other is connected by a lever with a crank, in the sub-basement below, which is propelled by a turbine water-wheel furnished with Potomac-water from one of the pipes of the building. Under its grinding "punch" our poor little dollar goes, and with it a hundred dollars beside. With a savage accuracy it stabs two holes through every one. This is done for the purpose of absolute cancellation. Then each bundle is returned to its box, the messenger picks it up, the counter follows, and both hasten to the cash-account clerk of the division, whose business it is to see if all the money received and delivered to the counters, has been returned and accounted for. Not until she sees her box of cancelled notes safe in the hands of this clerk, does the counter's personal responsibility end. Near the punches in the cancelling room is a ferociouslooking knife, set in an axle, which is consecrated to the purpose of cutting the cancelled bundles in two, through the middle of each note. These are made into packages of one hundred thousand dollars of fractional currency, and larger sums of legal tender notes; and are sent back to this office to be cut asunder by this knife. The duplicate paper and strap which our fair counter bound about this bundle, is so printed as to show, upon each half, the denomination, issue and amount of the notes enclosed. The counter's initials and the date of counting are also recorded at each end, as well as a number or letter to identify the bundle. These sundered notes are now sent, one-half to counters in the Secretary's office, the other half to counters in the Registrar's office, where every little wretched rag is re-counted. This is done as a check THE FUNERAL OF A DOLLAR. 337 on the Treasurer's counters, and to secure absolute accuracy. If these second counters discover a "short" or a "counterfeit" passed over by the first fair fingers, the full amount is taken out of the wages of the counter whose initials the tell-tale package bears. The Treasury mills grind slowly; but in the slow fullness of time the separate "counts" of three offices-the Treasurer's, the Register's, the Secretary's-are finally reconciled. The integrity of the Government, throughout the whole existence of its minutest fraction, has been maintained and demonstrated. In the process there is not much left of our poor little dollar, and nothing left for us but to go to its funeral. Like most of us, it has had rather a hard time in this world of ours. Where has it not lived—from a palace to "a pig's stomach ;" and what has it not endured-from the scarlet rash to the small-pox-and to think that nothing remains for it now but to be burned! Only through purgatorial flame can it be fully and finally "redeemed." About a quarter of a mile from the Treasury Department, in what is called "White Lot," stands the furnace which is to consume our dollar. The furnace, and the building in which it stands, was built expressly for this purpose for the sum of ten thousand dollars. The furnace is ten feet high, seven in diameter, circular and open at the top. With it is connected an air-blower, which is attached to an engine, the steam for which comes from a boiler some twenty rods distant. On the ground about lie piles of cinders—the metallic ashes of extinct dollars, compounded of pins, sulphur, printer's ink and dirt. To this furnace, filled with shavings in advance, every day comes "The Burning Committee," bearing the boxes of doomed dollars, sealed finally in the Register's and Secretary's Bureaus. This Committee is formed of a person from each of these Bureaus, with a fourth not connected with the Departments. In their presence the final seals are broken-the complicated locks of the furnace opened. Then the packages are thrown into the flames, each "lot" being called and checked by the Committee, the amount averaging about one million five hundred thousand dollars every other day. At the same hour about one hundred thousand dollars in national bank notes are burned at another and smaller furnace. Beside cancelled money, internal revenue and postage stamps, checks and defective new money are all consumed in this furnace. Here the three official delegates, with a few spectators, stand to witness the sight. Worn out, used up, gone by. -all pass into the furnace, our dollar with the rest. The furnace is locked, by official hands, with nine distinct locks. A match is set to the shavings; the smoke of the sacrifice begins to ascend-the Committee depart. The fire and the money are left alone together for the next twenty-four hours. To-morrow a smutty acrolite, smothered in ashes, will be the significant "finis" of the story of our dollar. It has had its day! |