The next process after assortment is to "make up" all the packages of all denominations into bundles, each containing only notes of a single bank. For this purpose the currency of active banks is delivered from the assorters through the teller to a "maker-up" who takes an inventory. Next day he assorts the packages of a group in a till similar to those already described, except that it is laid flat upon a low counter. Then he takes the contents of a box, ascertains, by examining the upper note of each package, that the money is all the issue of a single bank, and writes in ink upon a blank label the title of the bank, the amount of each denomination, and the total of all, signs and dates this, and straps it upon the bundle. Having emptied all the boxes of his till in this manner, he prepares a list of the amount of each bank's money made up, and verifies his work by comparing the footing with the total charged to him on the previous evening. This list is delivered to the bookkeepers, and upon it the accounts of the agency are based. From motives of saving in express charges, when the total of a bank's currency in the till is less than five hundred dollars, the money is not made up, but thrown aside as "odds," together with all excess over even thousands of dollars, when such excess is less than five hundred. These "odds" are returned, after account, to the vault. The work of making up employs from two to four persons constantly. Absolute correctness is of high importance, and great painstaking is required. Even a moment's relaxation of attention is likely to produce an error which, if not discovered, would involve the misplacement of hundreds or thousands of dollars. Fortunately, the system of checks and proofs is so thorough that all errors are discovered unfailingly, and the consequences confined to the agency. The different colored straps noticed in use for packages are but one feature of a general scheme by which currency in the office is made to indicate, at a glance, its description, proper place, and future course. The possibility of error or confusion in large amounts is thus reduced to the last degree. And minute precautions will hardly be deemed superfluous, when it is considered that all the processes described in this article are going on simultaneously every day at the heaped-up tills and counters.
On leaving the hands of the maker-up, the money is taken to the proving-room. Here the bundles are distributed among a force of women, who recount all the notes for the purpose of verifying the amount, the description, and the assortment. If, among the notes of a bank, is found one of another, the estray is exchanged, through the superintendent of assorters, for a note of the proper description. The prover, having ascertained that her money is correct according to the accompanying label, puts her initials to the latter, as well as upon each package of notes, wraps and ties the bundle, and carries it to a table, where, in her presence, the knots are sealed. First, however, the unfit notes are cancelled by removing a triangular piece from each of the lower corners. This is done by means of a knife, which is moved by hand with a lever, which easily cuts through two hundred notes at a time. The sealed packages are then put in the hands of the delivery clerk. At his counter the fit parcels are enveloped in a stout outside wrapper and directed to the various banks whose notes are contained in each. In this shape these parcels are taken to the office of the Adams Express Company for shipment. The unfit notes are delivered to the Comptroller of the Currency, by whose clerks they are again counted. When there is no longer any possibility of incorrectness either in the amount or the description, orders are made out for the issue of new currency, and the redeemed notes are carried to the basement of the Treasury, where they are put in a machine and reduced to pulp. This product is sold to paper makers, who, in consideration of its quality, are willing to buy it at a good price. There is a possibility, therefore, that the banker who several months ago forwarded his shipment of currency for redemption, may have the substance of his note return to him in these pages, bearing this account of the experiences of the journey.
Frank W. Lautz.
UNKNOWN PERSONS.
I was wandering through the Uffizi gallery in Florence one day, with my guide-book open in my hand, when I met the subjects of this story. They were by a large window, nine of them, framed in a little gilt frame a foot or so square. I looked at them, and then, by force of habit, I looked at the guide-book. "Portraits of nine unknown persons," it said. I went nearer and looked at them again, and after that I saw the guide-book no more. They were not portraits or unknown persons, but nine new friends who told me the story of their lives as I stood by the window gazing.
There were eight brothers of them, of a noble family, and dwelling in happy Tuscany. They lived in the country. Their mother was dead—died when Barnaba first opened his wondering eyes at her. Their father was a student, and loved his boys, and his books, and nature, and determined to keep them all together. "If we live in town," he said, "I can't do this; I am not very rich, so I will remain in my country home, and my boys and I will have a life of our own." Such a merry, merry life as the boys had together. Everything was turned to play for them, even their studies. Their principal delight was acting, and in their little plays, queer compounds of Grecian dramas and childish dreams, each one had his regular part. It was Pietro who was always the main figure, made the grandest speeches, and prayed the longest prayers—for they had religious dramas sometimes—and strutted around the most. They made Giuseppe their hero for all that, carried him in on their shoulders from battle, and crowned him with laurel at the end of the fourth act regularly. Domenico played the scholar: he had so grave an air, so learned a mien. Guido was the soldier boy. Let him but throw his cap on his wavy hair, or toss his coat over his shoulder and strut upon the mimic stage, and you would have sworn he was armed to the teeth, and that you could hear the click of his spurs.
How Barnaba loved Guido! How he would twirl his long hair over his finger secretly, hoping 'twould wave, and try to strut in on the stage heroically too. But he was sure to blunder a bit, poor Barnaba. He was the youngest, you see, and had poor parts given him that he didn't suit. He was not meant for a page, and sometimes, while Pietro would strut around and puff and declaim, little Barnaba was clenching his nervous hands tightly behind him, and longing that he might speak out like a man too. But no one ever dreamed that the stiff little page, with the long hair and the wondering eyes, had any wishes other than to make a good page. For Barnaba had a firm mouth, spite of the tremble at the corners, and it was always readier to shut than to open.
The other three boys, Luigi, Leonardo, and Leone, were good boys and happy boys, but they were by nature "the populace." They were always ready to come in on the stage as "the excited crowd" or "the hooting rabble." They threw up their hats and cried, "Si, si" splendidly, but then they would cry, "Nò, nò" just as well if it was their part to do so. So you can see they made a capital populace. Very near them, in a beautiful villa, there lived for a while in the summer time, once a little girl. Henrighetta she was called by her friends, but the boys' father bade them call her la signorina, "because," said he, "it is well to respect women." "But Henrighetta is only a little girl," said Barnaba. "Pshaw, she'll be a woman some day," laughed Guido, and twirled on his toes, "and I'll be a man." And he pulled away at some very make-believe moustaches, and raised his eyebrows until even his grave father laughed. For at this time Guido was only eleven and Barnaba seven. Pietro, the eldest—he was seventeen—very aged indeed, the lads thought. So Henrighetta became their playmate.