Year: 1874







The crisp one dollar bill IL as d
work of art simply beautiful. Fresh
from the press, with the promise to
pay unbroken by a crease, its pictures
unsoiled and unwrinkled, and its crink.
ly sound as significant of wealth rs
was the jingle Of coin in the barbarous
times when promise had contingent
relations with performance, tho dollar
bill is an object Of admiration and dc.
light. Few things are superior TO it
in nature or in art On tho upper
lcft-hand corner Christopher Columbus
is discovering the Land Of Promise
in the centre is the promise TO pay Of
the land he discovered, and on the
lower right-hand corner tho signature
of Treasurer Spinner, gon,Iomanl
whose Integrityis MS Roman as the
noso of Tho Father Of His Country,
whose portrait adorns the middle Of
the bill, because he never told q lie
There may be citizens who have never
seen this work Of art and symbol of
wealth in its crisp condition. Posi-
bly, to those to whom the dollar bill
has como limp, creased, and mcasly,
the statement that the portrait which
adorns it is Of the Father OF His Coun-
try, and that he wore Roman nose
when in life, and is so represented in
tho engraviDgs and that he never told
lie, may seem incredible. II is not
impossible that it may be doubted,
and that men-merc men-of whom
the poet beautifully says, "Men may
come, and men may go, but the one
dollar bill flows on forever'-may as
sert that this is not tho portrait of
any man who never told lie, and
that he does not wear q Roman nose
eithcr. 1t is the misfortune OF such
persons not to have seen dollar bill
when it was fresh and crisp; when
tho promise and Roman nose were
both unbroken by repeated foldings
and wrinklings, and the face of the
Father Of His Country had not been
pinched and punched and "wuzzled
up" into counterfeit prosentmcnt of
Judas Iscariot.


But the one dollar bill is not only
beautiful as a work Of art it is an
emblem of Democracy, medium of
exchange, vehicle of contagon, and
it "moves the crops" it passes
from high to low, from rich to poor,
from the Pharisee to the publican,
from the weak to the wicked. 1t
traverses all the strata of society, lev
els all distinctions, and diifuses all
manner of contagious diseases. Con
slider Tor a moment what great work
tho one dollar bill--and, for that mat
ter, the any other dollar bill, or the
half dollar stamp, or the new and
beautiful ten cent piece-does in diff
fusing those blessed diseases, the small
pox, the mumps and the measles.-
Every other species of portable rrar-
erty that goos into tho poethouso is
destroyed the currency of the realm
comes out and passes from hand to
hand, bearing contagion in its folds
and the aroma Of the hospital in its
creases. What boon is such cur.
rency. Witness the fight of the aut-
tering ten-cent piece, gathering up
tho measles on its wings and carrying
them to iiresidcs that might otherwise
never have rejoiced in them, or behold
tho swift course of that joy of the
counterfeit and terror OF the apple.
woman, the fifty-cent piece, as it ear
ries the smallpox from city to city.
and keeps up the demand in all well
regulated municipalities for pure vac
cine matter; or reflect upon the wide
diffusion through tho medium of the
one dollar bill Of that cxhileraling cpl.
demic of which the Duke of Argyle is
the patron saint and the Scotch fiddle
the accompaniment. There was never
a medium of exchange that went
abroad on so many crrands and per
formed them all so we'll II is well
named "thc best currency in the
world" Mr.. Morton signs its praises,
Mr.. Logan chants its wonderful works
a thousand Tyres reverberatc in tho
chorus, and Mr. Carpenter sheds il on
the just and the unjust. Whoever
undertakes TO handle il without gloves
gets the worst of it.


| And yet there are people who &C
about making fuss because this, th,
best currency in tho world, bears tho
promise of the United States to pay {
dollar, and the United States never
pay dollar, and will not say when
or II ever, they will pay the dollar
low unreasonable to stop the diffusion
of Democratic diseases in this way
1t is a neat and pretty currency, ant
by the time it gets to tho Mississippi
river is as sweet and pure as the poll
tics OF tho country OF which it is th,
emblem. What pity it would be t,
substitute coin for it, or do anythin,
TO interfere with its mission,