Evening star., 1898-07-25
First Shipment Made of the Sc
L Curities.
SUBSCRIBERS WILL NUMBER 100000
Enormous Amount of Work Yet to
= Be Done.
SMALL DELIVERIES FIRST

The Trea sury Department today made
the following interesting statement regard
Ing the delivery of the new bond issue:
THE first shipments of the new War
bonds were male today. They consisted of
LOCO bonds of 500 each and 1000 bonds of
$500 each. The public mind is poorly pre-
pared to comprehend the enormous labor
and multitudinous details connected with
this great popular loan. In the first place,
alter tie rejection and return of thousands
OF subscriptions to which no allotment
ccrid be made. there remain about 100000
persons to whom bends will be allotted
and forwarded in due course by express.
1t is not que: :tion cnly of 100000 names.
The name, including state, county, town
and street number Of each subscriber, must
be transcribed and rewritten in various
ways at least ten times. This is equivalent
to entering once, thus fully extended, three
million or more names.
This mere clerical work is however. but
a part of the prorlem: the collection of
checks and drafts received as payment for
bofdS, The computation of interest, prepara-
ton OF checks in settlement for same. the
engraving and printing of ten kinds or
denominations of bonds the accurate dis
position of these in envelopes properly ad-
dressed; all these are a part of the prob
lem that must be solved without error or
mind with the magnitude of the operation.
Each envelope must be sealed with three
seals. which means that 100000 seals in
wax must be imprinted to outgoing bonds.
Another important feature is the limita-
tion in the ability of the express agency TO
receive. forward and deliver the bonds
after they are committed to their care for
this purpose This limitation is estimated
by the express company at 5000 items per
day. 1t Is naturally prudent limit, since
on an average of only $500 In each envelope
the express company would receive as
fiduciary agents 2.500, 900 of the securities
per day, and If it required an average of
three days to make deliveries there would
be continuous trust Of s., 500, ,tG0. as large
an amount. perhaps, as the responsibility
OF the express company would justify.
The facts thus cited go to show that,
while subscribers in the sums of 81 500 or
less may rest secure in the certainty that
the bonds Will come to them all in due
time they must patiently wait the opera
ton of the government machinery. 1t is
understood that deliveries on the subscrip-
ttons of $500 and less, for which the money
has been all received will be made before
the larger subscriptions are attended to-
OF these small subscriptions there are 230-
&0 in number, and 1t Is estimated that for
ty days Will he requfred for their delivery
From this 1t Will appear that subscribers
in amounts larger than $500 will not begin
to receive their bonds until after Septem-
ber l. From THAT tdate on the bonds will
be put in the hands of the larger subscrib-
ers quite rapidly, since, numerically speak
ing, they aggregate less than one-third of
meantime theI larger subscribers will be
off1cially notified by the Treasury Depart
ment when and how payments in addition
to the per cent deposit will be required
and before rednitting funds they are re-
quested TO await such notice. Much con-
fusion will thereby he avoided -