R. M. PATTERSON, Director of the Mint.
Previous to the passage of the law by the Federal government for regulating the coins of the United States, much perplexity arose from the use of no less than four different currencies or rates, at which one species of coin was recoined, in the different parts of the Union. Thus, in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Maine, Rhode Island, Connecticut, Vermont, Virginia and Kentucky, the dollar was recoined at six shillings; in New York and North Carolina at eight shillings; in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Maryland at seven shillings and six pence; in Georgia and South Carolina at four shillings and eight pence. The subject had engaged the attention of the Congress of the old confederation, and the present system of the coins is formed upon the principles laid down in their resolution of 1786, by which the denominations of money of account were required to be dollars (the dollar being the unit), dismes or tenths, cents or hundredths, and mills or thousandths of a dollar. Nothing can be more simple or convenient than this decimal subdivision. The terms are proper because they express the proportions which they are intended to designate. The dollar was wisely chosen, as it corresponded with the Spanish coin, with which we had been long familiar.
Visiting the Mint.
The Mint, on Chestnut street near Broad, is open to the public daily, excepting Sundays and holidays, from 9 to 12 A. M. Visitors are met by the courteous ushers, who attend them through the various departments. It is estimated that over forty thousand persons have visited the institution in the course of a single year. Owing to the immense amount of the precious metals which is always in course of transition, and the watchful care necessary to a correct transaction of business, the public are necessarily excluded from some of the departments. These, however, are of but little interest to the many and are described under their proper heads. The system adopted in the Mint is so precise and the weighing so accurate, that the abstraction of the smallest particle of metal would lead to almost immediate detection.
On entering the rotunda, the offices of the Treasurer and Cashier are to the right and left. Farther in, in the hall, to the rear, on the right, is the room of the Treasurer’s clerks; a part of this was formerly used by the Adams Express Company, who transport to and from the Mint millions of dollars worth of metal, coin, etc.
The Deposit or Weighing-room.
SCALES.
On the left is the Deposit or Weighing-room, where all the gold and silver for coining is received and first weighed. The largest weight used in this room is five hundred ounces, the smallest, is the thousandth part of an ounce. The scales are wonderfully delicate, and are examined and adjusted on alternate days. On the right of this room is one of the twelve vaults in the building. Of solid masonry, several of them are iron-lined, with double doors of the same metal and most complicated and burglar-proof locks.
