June 25, 1892





Record  and  Guide.





987







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VOL. XLIX





JUNE  25.  1893.





No. 1.267





LAWS RELATING TO BUILDING IN NEW YOBK CITY.

Tlie Record and Guide's edition of the buiĩding laws, a handsovie,
neatly bound volurne of 300 pages, is published to day. Its title is
"Laws Belating to Bvilding in New York Citi/." 'Jt includes not only
the revîsed building law (ilhistrated and exliaustively indexed), but
the new and far-reaching factory inspection act, and the mechanics'
lien law and other enactments that need to be included to make any
edition of the New York building laws complete. It contains also
regulations of theneio Building Department, and a new aiid specially
revised and reliable directory of arehitecís of Neiv York, Brooklyn,
Newark, Jersey City, Hoboken and Union Hill. It isforsale at this
offlce at |2 per copy.

ON very narrow aiid professional lines there has been a bull
movement in the Stock Market for a couple of weeks, in
which prices while responding. to good news have boen very
slightly aflected by bad. The greatest impreseion has been made
recently by the continiiation of a heavy gold export movement
and the cnnset|uent signs of a bardening of money. The crop
outlook, the more cheerful conditions of general busineBs, and
more particularly a disoovery that many threatening dangers
have been more serious on their face than when investigated
have encouraged the employment of large amouuts of idle money
in the Slock Market and particuiarly among the Granger stocks.
With any evidences of hesitation on the part of loaners, it is
scarcely probable that the buying movement will continue, and
the reaction which has been begun on the gold exportations will
extend. With any such fear removed the people who have engi-
neered this bull movement will no doubt continue their efforts
until tbe public, who have hitherto kept aloof, come in and take
hold. The Grangers depend on crop news and the Southern
stocks on general business in their region. New England takes
on a new phase, with intimations that New Haven is making
advances towards acquiring control in some form. What that
form may be is for the moment not so important as the fact
that the advance is made by the bigger property, as it gives
more substantially to the claima of the value of New England
than was geiierally couceded. Up to now all that came from
New Haven quarters was tbat the New England property was a
worthless one and one that New Haven would soon be able to obtain
for very little. Now that the Readíng is operating in connection
with New England over the Poughkeepsie Bridge it seems that
New England has acquired a new value in the eyes of its foes.
Notwithstanding that Richmond Terminal has been placed in the
hands of a receiver the conviction holds good that Drexel, Morgan
& Co. will eventually announce a plan for tbe reorganization of that
property. The management of Richmond Terminal in a not very
long life succeeded in issuing over sixteen millioũ dollars of bonds
and seventy million dollars of stock, while keeping a heavy mort-
gage debt on all the properties that made up the system. Ever
since the troubles of the company began desire has been active,
though not aggressive, to know how that immense capitalizalion
was created with such disastrous results. Theexpertsandaccount-
ants employed by Drexel, Morgan & Co. must be constantly
uncovenng the facts an.l will do the shareholders and Wall Street
a signal service by placing them at the disposal of a committee of
the Btockholders to use, as they wiUbest helpthesecurity-holders in
their preseut trying emergency.





THE foreign trade of Great Britain still fails to show any symp-
toms of improvement. The returns for the month of May
show a slight iũcrease in the imports, amounting to 1.6 per cent.
while exports show a decrease of 10 per cent for ihe month and Sy^
per cent for the first five months of tbe year; and these move-
ment have taken place ici spite of the fact that there were two
more working  days in the past montb fchan in May 189L   Tkia is





a very unfavorable showing, and affords further evidence that the
recovery frona the shook which British trade received in 1890 musfc
be a slow one. The shook was not very sevfre in its immudiate
effects, and no rapid reaction could possibly be
expei^ted. One-half of the total decrease can be accounted
for by smaller shipmentsof iron, the principal reason for which ig
that, owin'g to the Durham coal strike, the trade has been under a
cloud—one which has now cleared away. It should be added that
if trade is dull it is eminently safe and sound, and no very severe
and prolonged depression is to be feared at present. Continental
markets are practically unchanged. Some small agitation was
caused by the fetea at Nancy and the meetings of the German
Emperor with the Czar and King Humbert. The impression
left by these political events has been, however, decidedly
favorable. The prospects for several years of peace have never
been oonsidered to be fairer. The weather in Austro-Hungary bas
been decidedly favorable to the development of the crops. After
the cool and rainy days with wbich May began, warm weather set
in and caused all kindsofgrain to grow rapidly; and subsequent
rainfalls promoted the growth still more. Wheat promises rery
well, both iu Austria and Hungary. At length there are some
signs of a substantial recovery of business in Argentina. The trade
returns are satisfactory, as showing that the severe commercial
depression caused by the general crisis and the excessive tazation
is at last beginning to pass away. There is an increase in th«
imports, a sure sign of trade revival; and the soundest part of this
increate is in dry-goods and edibles in general—60 per cent
in the former and 40 per cent in the latter. The customs
receipts show an increase of over 40 per cent. The interestinj;
ceremony of cutting and tipping the first sod oí the new English
trunk line was performed recently at'Chesterfield. This company,
called the Lancashire, Derbyshire & East Coast Railway, has
powers to^aise a capitt.I of eighi millions sterling, and proposes to
spend about £7,500,000 in the construction of its main line and ac-
cessories. The main line, which will be double and of first-class
standard throughout, wiU extend a distance of 130 miies from War-
rington on the Manchester Ship Caual through Macclesfleld, Bux-
ton, Chesterfield, and Lincoln to Sutton-on-Sea. Every preparation
is being made to converfc this sma.II town on the Lincolnshire coast
to an important coal port, and the cor ipany iutends to build docks
there. It is from its connection with the great Derbyshire and
Nottinghamshire coal fleld tbat the new compauy expects to derÍTe
its principal proflt. The estimate is made on the basls of a report
of tbe Government inspector of mines for the dislrict that Ihe new
company will be in connection with mines having a total annual
output of about 10,000,000 tons of coal, and will tap an unworked
coal field 200 square  miles in extent.    The line will also possess

valuable connections.

■

THERE is at last a near prospeot that the Rapid Transit burr
which has been for months such a prickly thing to liandle
will be open, and we shall see what there is in it for us. The cru-
cial test ot the value of the work done by the Rapid Transit
Commissioners will be made when the franchise of the proposed
underground system is offered for sale. The tendency of con.
"ervative opinion is to doubt that any purcbaser will come forwwd
for the new road. The commissioners themselvos, we beliere, do
not expect that private capital will have anything to do with the
system which they have so laboriously planned for, and are pri rately
of the opinion that for many years to come New York will have to
depend upon the elevated roads and such extensions of them as
can be made. In other words, it seems very probablo
that we have again swung around the circle, and
will find ourselves in exactly the same position we occupied two
years ago. Whatever the prejudices of the publicmay be, whether
they like it or not, it seems tousascertainascertain can be that ihey
will yet be driven to recognize the two facts which this journal has
been insisting upon for a long time past. The flrst of ihese is :
New York must accept the elevatcd roads as the only gource of
relief for their immediate necepsities. The wise ttiing to do is to
recognize these roads, as necessary evils if we will, but still. as
necessary, and to turn our backs on the assinine newspaper preju-
diceagainst Gould, etc, etc, and assiBt in friendly spirit the per-
feoting of the present system as far as possible and tbe exljension of
it as far aa is immediately necessary. The second fact is that any
really adequate system of rapid trangit f-T New York City must be
constructed by the city, This is not a matter of socialism or of the
municipalizationof industry; in facrt it has nothing at all to do with
any theory, but with the very necessities of our pngition—thenature
of the rapid transit system that New York requireg, the fact that ifc
is required immediately, that it cannot be left to glow development
by piecemeal, and that it has great prospective value, which makes
it most unwise for the city to part with the franchise ssve upon the

most favorable terma.

—---------m----------

CONSIDERING ihat the Democratic majority in  the present
House of Representatives was elected partly on the cry that the
" Díllion Dollar" CCmgress had bteien wagtĸful of the publte îmlái-i