November 3. 1883
The Record and Guide.
P51
THE RECORD AND GUIDE.
191 Broadway, N. Y.
TERMS:
ONE TBAR, iu advance, SIX DOLLARS.
Coram umcations should be addressed to
C. W, SWEET, 191 Broadway.
J. T. LINDSET, Business Manager.
NOVEMBER 3, 1883.
Wall street Is dull and blue just now, but really the business
situation is apparently improving. Gold is coming in very respect¬
able quantities from Europe, and the domestic exchangee outside
of New York show a distinct improvement, not only over previous
weyks, but also over the state of affairs this time last year. It is
reasonable to infer that business matters will get better from this
time forth, unless, indeed, some unespected business catastrophe
should occur.
The Court of Appeals has, it seems, decided that property-
holders along the river fronts who have built wharves under state
authority, have certain water rights which the city must pay for
should they be required for pubh'c uses. It is admitted tbat under
the original charters the city held the exclusive right to the water
fronts, but in numberless cases these were leased or sold to private
persons. The practical result will be that the city and state will
pay many millions of dollars for property which was once its own,
and with which it never should have parted. The nation, state or
municipality usually gets the worst of it when dealing with the cor¬
poration or individual, and this recent decision is another example
of that fact. The great body of the tax-payers will be mulcted for
the benefit of private persons, whose rights in many cases are
more imaginary than reai.
Property-holders-should see to in that the Senators and Assembly¬
men elected for this city are in favor of a general city railroad act,
under which charters can be granted for several lines of horse-cars
so imperatively needed. There should be a. horse-car track, for
instance, on Forty-second street. Passengers on the West Shore
road are now handed over to the tender mercies of the hackmen;
there is no way by which they can get across to the elevated roads
on Sixth and Ninth avenues without using a carriage. Then, as
everyone knows, we want street cars on the West side. There will.
or course, be a fight over this matter at Albany, I'or the existing
lines acd the omnibus owners wish to retain the monopoly. Two
excellent laws were enacted enabling the laying out of sireet rail¬
roads, but one was vetoed by Governor Cornell and the other bv
Governor Cleveland, a false issue being raised in both cases. It is
singular, by the way, that the daily press should be all but
unanimous in denouncing these needed improvementa.
The printers have made a very successful strike. They have
secured a decided advance on the wages heretofore paid them.
It is a curious fact that the price of labor and land is apt to go up
after liquidalion and lower prices have obtained in the stock
market and in general business. Just before the break of 1873
labor was never so well rewarded, but scarce a year had passed
after the hard times had set in when all tha trades unions were
broken to pieces. High labor of course makes dear production.
This puts a stop to improvements. Then comes idleness, and
Jinally the workmen out of employ compete with those in receipt
of the enhanced and unnatural prices. The building trade has been
seriously injured by the extravagant rates demanded by the work¬
men. A check has been given to house construction all over the
country, and before nest summer carpenters, masons, painters and
plumbers by the thousands will be found outside the regular work-
BhopB. The raising of wages in the face of extreme business
depression is suicidal; it is kiUing the "goose that lays the
golden eggs." Tbe working people are having their last innings
in the way of wages. From this time forth the employers will have
the advantage. The shrinkage in stock, and in lhe price of woolen
and cotton goods, in provisions and cereals wili finally affect the
labor market, and the working people will be very glad to accepi
sixty per cent, of their present wages.
Thescenein tbe Comptroller's Office when the head of that de¬
partment decided to remove Auditor Johnson was a very extraor¬
dinary one. The subordinate, through his lawyers, grossly insulted
the Comptroller, who was unable in any way to punish his assail¬
ants. This disgraceful state of affairs is due to the decision of the
Court of Appeals, whioh nullified the act of the Legislature giving
heads of municipal departments the right to peremptorily remove
any of their subordinates. On the strength of an old English
common law precedent the court decided that the Police Commis¬
sioners, whom Ex-Mayor Cooper removed, had a right to a trial,
at which charges should bo made against them and counsel plead
in their defence. The Mayor was madea judge without any author¬
ity to commit for contempt. It was said at the time that the de¬
cision was an outrage, and that the court ought to have been de¬
nounced from one end of the State to the other. Unofficial and
even criminal subordinates can, under this preposterous decision,
defy their chiefs to remove them. If the affairs of the world were
done in that way chaos would return. To all appearances matters
will be a great deal worse before they are better. Our local gov¬
ernment is all in confusion. There is no responsibility or authority
anywhere, and for this state of things our courts are mainly re¬
sponsible.
The Mount Morris Bank.
Harlem, speaking architecturally, and speaking generally, is
one of the most depressing quarters of New York. There is m its
streets the thoughtless and conventional repetition of forms intrin¬
sically bad which makes up the bulk of the architecture of this
island. But in Harlem, owing to the suburban character of the
place, this character ismixed with the character of a frontier town,
with something particularly raw and Peoriau. The exceptions are
very few ; a good granite church by Mr. Congdon, in One Hundred
and Twenty-seventh street, and an interesting experiment not every¬
where successful, in the use of colored bricks, also a church, in
One Hundred aud Twenty-flftli street. We recall no others. Wheu
an architect undertakes to do something in Harlem, we are there¬
fore particularly grateful to him. If he does something which is
not more tiresome by its outrageousnesn than the ordinary building
of Harlem by its platitude, we are particularly apt to be a little
blind to his faults and very kind to his virtues.
Messrs. Lamb & Rich have made such an attempt in tho Mount
Morris Bank, at the corner of Fourth avenue and One Hundred and
Twenty-fifth street. Inasmuch as we have thought it right to say
some pretty hard things of some works by these architects, sucb
as the Armour houses in Fifth avenue and some houses in Sixty-
ninth street, in which we were unable to discern any signs of any
other purpose than to "collar the eye" at all iiazards and without
the least scruple or discrimination as to means, it gives us
especial pleasure to say that this work in Harlem, like the Com¬
mercial building at Broome street and Broadway, and in a leas
degree the Henderson cottages at Eighty-sixth etreet and Avenue
B, is a very grateful exception to the thoughtless routine, showing,
as it does, aome purpose, apart from the purpose of making an ex¬
ception.
To be aure, this is not of itself very high praise. A low degree
of skill calls for an exaggerated expression of gratitude, such is the
dismal character of our routine building. But this building offers
interesting points of composition and interesting points of detail.
It covers about 35 feet on the west side of Fourih avenue by
about 90 feet ou the north side of One Hundred and Twenty-fifth
street, with a projecting porch forming the entrance to the bank at
the corner, projecting about 5 feet and extending about 20 rlong
the long side. Midway down this side an arch in the basement
gives access lo safe deposit vaults, while another arch at the west
end is the entrance to the apartments which occupy the upper
floors, tho vaults occupying tbe basement, the bank apparently
occupying the whole of the first story, and the apartments the
four upper stories, with an additional story lighted by tall dormer
windows in the roof. The porch and the basement, the frieze
above the first story and sorre string courses and the quoins at the
corners are in brown stone, the mass of the wall is red brick, two
three-story oriels running through the apartments oa the side and
one forming the whole front above the bank in metal painted a
dark green. This oriel in the front is crowned with a double gable.
The oriels on the side stop at the cornice, and the line of the steep
mansard roof above them is broken by Eihingled gables with crow-
steps in wood or metal. The covered cornice is of metal also.
The large arch, with superfiuQus members al the side, is the
noticeable feature of the basement. In the first story the front is
a pair of round arches with a Renaissance grotesque between theui
on the corbel which purports to carry the oriel. On the side in this
story is an arcade of four round arches. A broad stone frieze
marks the division between the bank and the apartments above,
The oriel, aa has been said, occupies the whole front above this
first story. Ou the side, between the two oriels, is a group of
three openings, the central one the widest, running through two
stories, with panels in the interval, and closed by a round arch
over each of the lateral openings and an elliptic arch, with a
I:ink keystone over the central openings. Than, separated ly a
string course, a story of square-headed openings, very simply
treated, and then the metal frieze and cornice and the roof, with
hipped canopies, projecting o^ er the dormers. The aky line is
fumher animated by several chimneys, pairs of them flanking the