The actual usable cash of a bank is represented by the silver, gold and bills on deposit.

It is estimated that the gold in use in the world amounts to $7,000,000,000, and that an equal amount has been lost through wear and other causes since the earliest times. A million dollars in gold could be put into a box two feet square and a foot deep. All the gold in the world could-be put into a room 64 feet by 50 feet with a height of 20 feet. It is estimated that a million dollars worth of gold is each year buried in the cemeteries of the United States in the mouths of the dead.

The gold in our banks lies piled in bags containing $5,000 each. Each bag weighs twenty-two pounds. Standard gold is worth $18.96 an ounce, and a $20 gold piece weighs 211/2 pennyweights. In shipping gold from New York to London it is estimated that a million dollars in gold may be reduced in value, by the coins rubbing against each other, about $175.

If a standard gold coin falls short one-half of one per cent of its original standard weight, it is marked "light weight" the moment it reaches the United States Treasurer. It then ceases to travel as money.

The United States bills which are considered cash are of a variety of kinds. There are in circulation over $300,000,000 of treasury notes of the following denominations: $1, $2, $5, $10, $50, $100, $500, $1000. These are payable in coin, either gold or silver.

The national bank notes are really promissory notes, issued by the banks, and payable on demand. They are secured by, and issued upon, United States bonds.

Every national bank must redeem its notes in full in lawful money at the treasury in Washington or over its own counter whenever a demand for payment is made. The denominations of the national bank notes are the same as those of the Treasury notes, except that there are no bills smaller than $5.

The silver certificates are notes issued by the United States government and payable on demand in silver dollars. Some hundreds of millions of dollars of this form of money are now in circulation.

Notwithstanding the fact that the paper used is of the very best quality, paper money, the world over, is constantly becoming ragged and mutilated.

It may be well to quote here the law which regulates the redemption of mutilated bills. If the whole face of a note is in a condition which will permit its being recognized as a genuine bill it will be paid in full. If not more than two-fifths of the paper of a national bank note is gone and the note shows the name of the bank and the signature of one of its officers, it will be paid in full.

United States notes, Treasury notes of 1890, fractional-currency notes, gold certificates, silver certificates, and national-bank notes, when mutilated so that less than three-fifths, but clearly more than two-fifths, of the original proportions remains, are redeemable by the Treasurer only, at one-half the face value of the whole note or certificate. Fragments not clearly more than two-fifths are not redeemed, unless accompanied by a satisfactory affidavit.

Fragments less than three-fifths are redeemed at the face value of the whole note when accompanied by an affidavit of the owner or other person having knowledge of the facts that the missing portions have been totally destroyed.