The package thus wrapped and tied is labelled with the printed name of the exchange office for which its contents are intended, and thrown into a large basket. When the basket is full, it is wheeled over to the pouching rack, an iron frame divided into sections, each section bearing the name of an exchange office, and provided with four hooks which hold open a mail sack. The pouching clerk takes the packages of letters, reads the labels thereon, and throws them into the proper sack. When full (about seventy-five pounds), the sack is taken down and ready for tying and sealing up. The last sack taken down receives the letter-bill for the exchange office of destination. The sack is tied, and a label bearing the name of the office for which it is destined is inserted in the string. After several turns have been taken, both ends of the string are passed through the holes at the bottom of a small tin cup which is subsequently filled with hot wax, so that the string cannot be removed without its being cut open (see illustration on page 71). In this country labels made of good Holland linen are used fresh for each sack. In other countries other material is employed, some using leather, some wood, some strong cardboard. The return of labels of any value is generally requested, and they are used over and over until worn out. Great Britain does not use labels of any kind, but has the address of each sack stencilled on the sack itself, thus: "London for New York." This, of course, renders the sack useless for any other service. In the United States the labels are white for letter sacks, buff for papers, and cardinal red for registered mails.
The newspapers are assorted in the basement of the Post-office, very much in the same fashion as letters, but they are not tied up in bundles. The separating cases into which they are thrown are so made that a sack hanging at the lower end of the box receives the mail thrown therein, and when full, it is ready for tying, labelling, and sealing up. In this department are received the queerest odds and ends going through the mails to foreign countries, newspapers especially being selected to hide in their folds sundry articles of every description sent to friends "in the auld country." Jewelry, from the penny kind to really valuable articles, handkerchiefs galore, baby's dressing outfits, rattlesnake skins, plugs of tobacco, cucumbers--these and many other curios of every description are found and stopped. If the address of the sender appears on the package, it is returned to him direct. Otherwise it goes to the Dead Letter Office, where it is kept a certain length of time awaiting to be claimed. The unclaimed part is finally sold at auction.