Smyrna times., 1876-09-27
About Dead Letters.

foolishness and stupidity which are dis
played at the Dead-Letter Office Museum.
Arranged in glass cases on the four sides of
the room are all these waits Of travel, dis.
played with view to their respective
attractions, and suggestive of the trcachery
of postage-stamps and the adverse fate
which sometimes overtakes even mailbags.
There is everything known to the useful
and ornamental; everything not smaller
than a thimble or larger than a stove-pipe
hat.
Such a pathetic array of might have
beens, so eloquent Of disappointments and
blighted hopes! Locks Of hair--there are
whole switches of them-and as for photo
graphs, we are told that there are forty
bushels of them III the basement of the
building. But fancy yourself the recipient
of nice parcel from the hands of the post
man some morning, which upon being
opened discloses live snake! Whether
one would 60 in raptures or Mysteries at
such treasure would be matter of taste,
| suppose. But, then, people do send
snakes through the mail, and sometimes
they come back to the Dead Letter Office
for want of claimant, and we see them
leading a serenely spiritual existence in a
glass jar among other stray postal curiosi-
ties. 1t is a fact that a postmaster once
found small live alligator disporting
among the letters and papers in a small
bag. There was also a bouquet of fresh
flowers, which had slipped out of its box;
and couple Of empty boxes, very similar
in size and shape, and both addressed to
ladies, left the poor man in doubt as to
which the alligator belonged, and to which
the flowers. Imagine the fair recipient of
the flowers finding a monster in her box.
instead of the delicate offering which she
had expected! But the postmaster made
no blunder; he put the flowers into the
box, the alligator into the other; notified
the ladies Of the slight confusion of proper.
ty which had taken place, and directed
each to exchange with the other if she
should receive the wrong article. But he
was gratitied to learn shortly afterwards,
that there had been no mistake made.
Jewelry is one of the articles most com
monty ntrusted to letters and postal
packages.
One can hardly realize that there is a
daily average Of $4,000 or $1,000 dead let
tiers, or about 100000 month. Allowing
one person to letter, there are 100000
persons every month who undertake to
send letters either without stamps, without
addresses, or with cancelled stamps, INSULT.
| cient postage, or illegible or incorrect
addresses. Many of them are without
either stamp or address, and often with no
signature which gives the slightest clew OF
persons sending them. There are 10000 a
month received that either lack postage or
address, or else have insufficient or can.
cellod stamps; and, strange as it may SEEM
these are sometimes the most valuable let
ters, often containing currency of drafts
! for large amounts of money. 1t is estima
ted that there is about $4,000,000 in drafts
and $4,000 in cash received yearly through
dead letters. This all returned, if possible
to persons sending it; but if any portion oi
it fails to find claimant, it is turned over
to the Postofiice fund.
Very little difficulty is experienced in
restoring checks and drafts to the rightfuI
owners, but the money generally comes in
small sums, and is usually sent in the mos
careless, haphazard fashion, and the loss o
these small sums and the ignorance OF
carelessnoss with which they are launched
upon a journey represents deal of suffering
and disappointment. Some hard.working
man may send $50, the savings of month.
labor, to his wife and little ones, whom ht
has had to leave behind him; but, alas he
is one of the forty thousand who trust tC
Providence without stamp or address, Of
else his writing or orthography are beyond
mortal ken, and so the poor wife never get.
the pittance, which is her all.
1t is very amusing to see the letter.
opened, and guess at their contents before
they are brought to light. Three out o.
five from bundle of unaddresssd letter.
contained money, one of them s. note
Then there are such quantities of dress
samples in letters, one would imagine thai
all womankind had discovered language
in the interchange of these scraps of dress
fabrics. One.half show their prosperity in
bits of silks and satins, and the other hal
bits of six.penny calico, and it is only in
the Dead.Letter Office that they meet on
common ground. Certainly every fifth
letter contains photograph, and / dom
imagine that any great care is taken tc
return lost photographs, but any one SC
bereaved has the privilege of rumaginl
among the forty bushels of human "coun
terfeits" which have accumulated here.
The NEW PosrAL LAw.--0ne of the mos
sensible items in the new postal law, anc