are maintained.

The _third assistant postmaster-general_ has charge of financial
matters. He provides stamps, stamped envelopes, and postal cards for
post-offices, and receives the reports and settlements of postmasters.
He also superintends the registered mail service, the postal savings
system, and the post-office money-order business. By means of money
orders people may deposit money in the post-office at which they mail
their letters, and have it paid at the office to which their letters
are addressed.

The _fourth assistant postmaster-general_ has charge of the rural free
delivery system,--a very important service. He also furnishes blanks
and stationery to post-offices throughout the United States, and
supervises the making of the various post-route maps, such as those
used for rural delivery and for the parcel post.

INTERIOR DEPARTMENT.--The secretary of the interior is the chief
officer of the interior department. The former name, _home
department_, suggests the character of the subjects under its control.
Its duties relate to various public interests which have been
transferred to it from other departments. The department of the
interior has charge of pensions, public lands, Indian affairs, patents,
education, and the geological survey.

The _commissioner of pensions_ has charge of the examination of pension
claims and the granting of pensions and bounties for service in the
army and the navy. There are about a million names on the pension
rolls of the United States, and the annual payment of pensions amounts
to about one hundred and forty million dollars.

The _commissioner of the general land office_ superintends the surveys
and sales of the lands belonging to the national government. The
United States surveys divide the public lands into ranges, townships,
sections, and fractions of sections. Ranges are bounded by north and
south lines, six miles apart, and are numbered east and west. Ranges
are divided into townships, each six miles square, numbered north and
south. A township is divided into thirty-six sections, each one mile
square, and containing six hundred and forty acres of land; and
sections are divided into quarter sections.

The _commissioner of Indian affairs_ has charge of questions relating
to the government of the Indians. Its agents make treaties, manage
lands, issue rations and clothing, and conduct trade with the Indians.

The _commissioner of patents_ conducts all matte