"The contract for the manufacture of postage stamps having expired on the 10th of June, 1861, a new one was entered into with the National Bank Note Company of New York, upon terms very advantageous to the Department, from which there will result an annual saving of more than thirty per cent, in the cost of the stamps. In order to prevent the fraudulent use of the large quantity of stamps remaining unaccounted for, in the hands of postmasters in the disloyal States, it was deemed advisable to change the design and the color of those manufactured under the new contract, and also to modify the design of the stamp upon the stamped envelope, and to substitute as soon as possible the new for the old issues. It was the design of the Department that the distribution of the new stamps and envelopes should commence on the first of August, but, from unavoidable delays, that of the latter did not take place until the 15th of that month. * * * Those of the old issue have been exchanged and superseded. The old stamps on hand, and such as were received by exchange, at the larger offices, have been to a great extent counted and destroyed, and those at the smaller offices returned to the Department." The Act of the 27th Congress, Statute II, Chapter 37, Section 14, approved March 3d, 1861, had so qualified the Act of 1851: "As to require the ten cent rate of postage to be prepaid on letters in the mail, from any point in the United States east of the Rocky Mountains to any State or Territory on the Pacific, and from any State or Territory on the Pacific to any point in the United States east of the Rocky Mountains. And all drop letters shall be prepaid by postage stamps." Other sections also introduced minor changes in the rates on printed matter, which it is not important to notice. The denomination of the stamps of the new issue therefore remained at first the same. The circular letter from the Department to the several postmasters, informing them of the change is as follows: POST OFFICE DEPARTMENT. _Finance Office_ ... 1861. POSTMASTER, Sir: You will receive herewith a supply of postage stamps which you will observe are of a new style, differing both in design and color, from those hitherto used, and having the letters U. S. in the lower corners of each stamp, and its respective denomination indicated by figures as well as letters. You will immediately give public notice through the newspapers and otherwise, that you are prepared to exchange stamps of the new style for an equivalent amount of the old issue, during a period of six days from the date of the notice, and that the latter will not thereafter be received in payment of postage on letters sent from your office.