The whole basement floor of the north wing of the Treasury is occupied by the busy counters of mutilated money. Here sit one hundred and eighty women counters, restorers and detectors. Side by side, we see the faded and the blooming face. Here is the woman, worn and weary—born, more than likely, to ease and luxury—thankfully working to support herself and her children; and at the very next table, a maiden, whose fresh youth, care has not yet worn out—each working with equal thankfulness, to support herself, and besides, perhaps, father and mother, brother, sister or child. [Illustration: COUNTING WORN AND DEFACED GREENBACKS, AND DETECTING COUNTERFEITS. This room is in the Redemption Bureau, Treasury Building. Over One Hundred Thousand Dollars worth of Fractional Currency alone is here daily received for redemption; out of which about $350 dollars’ worth of counterfeit money is detected, stamped and returned. ] The time of toil, for one who must earn her living, is not long; indeed, the hours are fewer than the average hours of ordinary labor. She does not complain of them; she is grateful for her chance. Yet her working-day is as long as her brother’s. Her chance, alone, is less. For the same hours and the same toil, her stipend is one-fourth smaller than his smallest. At three o’clock P. M., hats and shawls come down from their pegs, lunch-baskets come forth from their hiding-places, the great corridors, and porticoes, and broad streets are thronged with homeward-wending workers. For the space of half an hour, the Treasury-offices and halls seem deserted, and then—Lo! the Broom Brigade! Cobwebs, dust and dirt, no longer dim the granite steps, the tessellated floors, the marble surfaces of the Treasury-building, as they used to do, years ago. Congress has provided a Broom Brigade, with fifteen dollars a month, to pay each member—and here they come, the sweepers, the dusters and the scrubbers—ninety women! Three years ago, was established the present efficient system of daily cleaning of the Treasury, exclusively under feminine control, with what perfect result, all who remember the Treasury as it was, and see it as it is, can bear witness.