AND   BUILDERS'   GUIDE,





Vol. XI.





NEW YOFJv, SATURDAY, JANUARY 18, 1873.





Ne. 253.





Published Weeklu by

THE REAL ESTATE RECORD ASSOCIATION.

TERMS.

One year, in advance......................5f6 00

AU communications should be addressed to

C. AV. s"wjî;e:t.

■7 AND 9 Warken Stuhet.





The Committee of Seventy had better ref orm,
excluding ail the oflS.ce-holders, and pledging
the remaining members not to hold office. "WTiat
say yon, gentlemen?





No receipt for money due the ReaTj Estate Rkcoud
will be acknowledged unless sisned by one of our regular
coUector.s. HKNav D. Smitii or TirOMAH F. Cujhtings.
AU biUs for collection will be sent from the office on a regu-
larly ju-iuted form.





Spécial Notice.

^ For nearly half a centui-y .'Vdam HAJtPTONi Sr., was uni-
versally known as the leadins manufacturer of Grate.s,
Fender.', and Fire-place Hfater.s, in New York, and a large
number of.the improvements that hâve been made in snuh
apparatuif^. p:irticularly Gr.ite.?, were either invented or in¬
troduced byhim, ami his sons, who liave, since his decease,
succeeded him in the business, seem to be similarly enter-
prising. for their show-room, at the old .stanil, No. Gold
street, contains some very eleaant spécimens of their hand¬
icraft—where also everything that is new and useful in'their
line ol business may be obtained at reasonable priées.





^ WlTU this number of the Record we présent
to our subscribers a copy of the Index of the
New York Conveyances of Real Estate for
Vol. IX. and Vol. X. of the year 1872. The
regular price for the Index hereafter will be
one dollar per year. The next one issued will
be much more complète and wiU be indispensa¬
ble ia connection with the bound volume of the
Record. Subscribers desiring to préserve the
Record for the coming year can procure pat¬
ent jaies from this office, price, $1.00 each.





It is a pity that some reform movement is
not started, the leaders of which would pledge
themselves not to accept office or take any
patronage. The Committee of Seventy hâve
undoubtedly lost caste with the community, from
the fact that so many of them are aiready
either office-holders, or aspirants for officiai po¬
sition. A suspicion of interested personal mo¬
tives is very damaging to would-be reformers.
Rev. Mr. Beecher recently defended that much-
abused class, the politicians. He said, very
truly, that the expérience they had acquired
■was useful to the community, but they ought
to be restrained by a wholesome public opinion.
This is true, and that wise, enlightened public
opinion can best be focalized by organizations of
citizens who hâve no axes to grind, or personal
ends to serve.

Surely there are enough of large property-hold¬
ers who would be willing tp act without hope
of place, and who could keep watch on the
ti'àined politicians to see that their covetous
ii^stincts did not get the better of tlieir oivic
virkie.





We again caU the attention of property-hold¬
ers to the suggestion we made so frequently last
winter touching the formation of a Board of
Audit, composed exclusively of large holders of
real property, whose business it would be to
pass upon ail biUs presented for payment to the
city. This board to hâve no power further than
to report to the comptroUer. This would be a
wholesome check upon fraudulent or excessive
bills. It will be remembered that even the
Ring bills were for proper objects ; the frauds
were in the amounts. As the property-holders
hâve to pay ail the biUs, there would be an
obvious propriety in their examination of aU
claims against the city.

It is idle to talk of giving power over city
matters exclusively to property-holders ; that,
the présent state of public feehng -will not
stand, but they might hâve the power to exam¬
ine the bills they will be called upon to pay.
WiU our charter-makers please think of this ?





HOW IS THE MAïlKET ?

Old Mrs. Partington once remarked to her
beloved Isaac, in response to an expressed
doubt as to the creditability of a certain taie
of woe, that " it must be true because it was
printed iu the newspapers." We doubt, how¬
ever, if even the elastic mind of this worthy
dame could reconcile the leamed disquisitions
on the state of the New York Real Estate Mar¬
ket, which we subjoin :

{From the " World," January ISth.)

There are as yet no signs of a revival in the
real estate market. During the past week but
little business was transacted, and but for the
légal sales which were daily held at the Ex¬
change Salesroom there would hâve been no¬
thing interesting to report. Thèse sales are,
however, very interesting to the pubhc, from
the fact that they continué co be very numer¬
ous, and the major portion of them being
f oreclosure sales of houses of a good class that
hâve been eiected or partly erected upon lots
bought with building loans by spéculative
buMers.

{From the " Times," same date.)

The market during the past week has given
évidence of a marked improvement, for not
only hâve the auctions held been more numer¬
ous and morè largely attended, but business on
the street has been more active, and the de¬
mand for real estate at private sale is growing
strpnger. Considérable inquiry is also being
made for property to leaae, and a good gênerai
,£ieafion is anticdpated.





ME. EUSKIN'S ART LECTURES.

Mr. Ruskin has, for some years past, start.
led the reading public with many extraordinary
opinions, subversive of ail former notions en¬
tertained by intelligent people, but never did
he go further than at a supplementary lecture
on Sancho Botticelli which he delivered
recently at the Taylor Institute, Oxford. In
extoUinghjs hero'sfondnees forflowers, andde-
scribing his roses and lilies as the most perfect
art ever presented, he was carried away with
his usual enthusiasm to boast of the artist's
Qliterateness as a point of émulation. Botti¬
celli, he said, was bom in 1457, and resolute-
ly refused to leam to read or write—"a thing
which he wished other little boys and girls
would do." As if this pièce of eccentric ad-
vice were not enough, he next informed his
hearers that he had recently visited the G-DS-
TAVE Dore exhibition, and found it "the
abomination of désolation—a mass of devils,
corruption and death; no life, no motion, no¬
thing but the vilest art and the vilest concep¬
tion." This is the exhibition of paintings
which other men of the highest art culture
hâve visited, and pronounced one of the most
marvellous illustrations of artistic versatility
and power which the âge has produced. How
any man of cultivated perceptions could -visit
that gaUery of paintings in Bond street, study
such productions as Dore's Francesca de
Rimiui, Triumph of Christianity, the Néo¬
phyte, etc. —among countless other proofs of
genius—and, remembering that so many and
such varied spécimens emanated from the
easel of one man who is stUl young, could find,
no better words of comment upon them, is
simply incompréhensible. Mr. Ruskin has
written many superb contributions to art criti-
cism, but his remarkable abandonment of the
vagaries of Turner, after teaching ail the
world how to bow down and worship them,
tended much to shake public reliance upon his
judgment ; and a few more such intemperate
and absurd denunciations as that just made
against G-USTAVE Dore will convince every-
body that the strongest condemnation of the
great author of "Modem Painters" is of
infinitely more value to an artist than his
warmest predse.





TRANSIT.

A FEW years ago one of the principal topics
discussed among real estate operators was the
constantly recurring one of the Eighth avenue
grade, which one year was to be this, and the
next year to be that, until it seemed as though
the india-rubber question never would be set-
tled. Now we hâve a parallel to the Eighth
avenue grade in the Rapid Transit