The daily morning journal and courier., 1896-09-15

the lowest drawer III d ClleSl ol u'e CTS built into a closet. Surely nobody would have thought of looking there; but it was otherwise with the mice, which found the wac af paper notes first rate material for nests.
 Only a few days ago some money reached the treasury from Wisconsin, It was $360 in ten dollar and twenty dollar bills. The sum had been turned up out of the ground by blow. But the remarkable feature of the story is that the place where the cash was found is an almost uninhabited dis trict. The owner of the land obtained it from the government a short time back and it was in the process of clearing for cultivation that he came across the tin box which contained the treasure The question is, who could have buried money in so remote and unsettled region? For what reason could it have been buried there, and why was it never dug up? There is no telling what drama, or robbery may lie behind the strange discovery. AS for the $360, though somewhat dam aged it has been redeemed.
 Contemporary history has recorded the case of Jason B. Smith of Ypsi- lanti, who buried S119,o0O in notes of large denominations in a hole in the ground. Finding them nearly destroy ed by dampness, he did them up in a pillow case and started for Washing ton with the pillow case tied around his body He received from the treas- ury brand new bills in exchange, and was robbed of the entire sum on his way back home. The family Bible, the unabridged dictionary, the tea cad dy. the clock, the toes of old shoes, and
 in the pockets of disused dresses hang ing in the closet-all these are common hiding places for the hoard. A stock ing is a convenient substitute for a purse, and may be readily concealed in an out If the way corner
 | In rural parts the parlor stove is q | favorite place of concealment for the | family wad. It is only thus employ l ed for temporary purposes, however.
 Every now and then somebody unac- | quainted with the situation of the hoard lights the stove, and 1t goes up | in smoke About one hundred cases | of this kind are referred to redemption
 bureaus every autumn. They are the
 most hopeless kind, nothing but ashes
 being left usually Recently turned up
 the case of a Jersey woman who put | her money in the coal scuttle and cov-
 cred it with coal. Another member of
 the household thought that the fire
 needed replenishment, and that settled
 the business. Many persons think l 4r oa1 | is beneath the floor of room, or may
 be between the laths and plastering of | a wall In either case the result is the
 same-the mice get at it and tear the
 notes into little bits for nests.
 | Mice are inveterate destroyers of
 paper money. Frequently they find it | in drawers and chew 1t up. They cut
 it into such small fragments that it is
 apt to be impossible to put them to- l gether again so as to identify the cash. The tearing done by the little rodents is so characteristic and peculiar that
 the manner of it can hardly be imitat-
 ed successfully. People often send torn up notes to the treasury, claim ing falsely that they represented large | sums destroyed by mice; but the ex- perts of the redemption bureau are l able to distinguish with certainty the | work of mice from that of human hands. One person forwarded what he declared to be the remains of S3,0OC
 which had been hidden under a carpet
 and attacked by mice. The treasury
 paid $20 for the lot, deciding that this
 was the sum represented, and that ii
 had been torn into tiny scraps by the | fingers rs.-Washington Letter to the Boston Trascript.