November 20, 1884





1 he Kecord and Uuide.





1195





THE   RECORD  AND   GUIDE.

Published every Saturday.
191   Broadway,   N.  Y.





TEKMS:

0»E ¥E.\R, m advance, SIX DOLLARS.

Communicatioua should be addressed to

C. W.  SWEET,  191   Broadway.

J. T. LINDSEY, Business Manager.

NOVEMBER 29, 1884.

We have been expecting a belter feeling in the stock market
just ."3 sooQ as tlie corn crop would commence to move, and in
spite of railway wars aud tlio cutting cf passenger fares stocks
have advanced duriug the past week, and, with occasional reactions,
will, we think, continue to advance. We expect also to see better
prices for wheat and cotton and a more active demand and better
prices for staple goods. But the liquidation that commenced in
18S1 has not yet run its courae, 1885 will see a great deal of distress
among manufacturers and the working classes. Failures in
general business will be very common, but we believe that our
railway system has seen the worst, and western farmers who
have not become involved in land speculation will be far better off
at the end of this crop year than they were at the beginniug.





Last week we ventured to predict that the football contest
between Yale and Princeton, on Tlianksgiving Day, would turn
out to be r more dangerous and debasing exhibition than any
"slugging" match ever held in New York city; and so it proved.
More botlily hai'm was done than it would be possible to accomplish
in a score of boxing exhibitions at Madison Square Grarden. Aside
from the cruel and unnecessary wounds inflicted, the bad blood
and squabbling on tho ground was disgraceful in the extreme. If
the Grand Jury had reason to indict the backers of the slugging
exhibitions, in which no one was seriously injured, why do they
not bring in true bills against Presidents Porter and McCosb, of
Yale and Princeton Colleges? Ic does not help tbe matter tbat the
patrons of Sullivan ard his competitors are generally a disrepu¬
table lot, and that the enormous crowd on tbe Polo grounds whs
composed of the very clilc of our fashionable aud educated classes.
Indeed it makes the matter all tbe woree. Brutality is a far more
serious offense in the latter class thsn in tbe formsr. If these
football matches are to continue the polico have no business to
interfere with the far more harmless contests of the professional

pugilists.

----------•----------

Mayor Edson it not ending his official career with credit to him¬
self. His straining of a legal point to deprive the incoming Maj^or
of important appointments cannot be .iustified on any p'.ea of the
public good, while his discourtesy to Mayor-elect Grace is manifest.
The persons be has appointed for Police Commissioners are not fit
for their positions "End seem to have been chosen in the interest of

Johnny " O'Brien. We have tried to do justice to Mayor Edson
during bis official career, but we can find no justification for his
recent action in appointing French and McClave as Police Commis¬
sioners. He has the undisputed right to appoint a Commissioner
of Public Works and a Corporation Attorney, and no one could
blame him if be chose for those positions two of his own political
and personal friends, provided they were honest and competent,
but be should not have meddled with the Police Commissioners.
But how strangely things come about: Governor Cleveland vetoed
the tenure of office bill, the only reform measure be failed to
approve, to save his most influential backer at Chicago, Hubert O.
Thompson, but the latter will after all lose liis position, when,
had the tenure of office bill been approved, he might possibly have
been re-appointed by the incoming Mayor. The President-elect
will be forced to provide for Mr. Thompson, a tbing which will not
look very well among the first acts of a reform President.





Pending   the   local   election   we  wondered  why   it   was  that
"Johnny " O'Brien deliberately handed over the city government
to the political opponents of the Kepublican party.    As the Demo¬
cratic vote of 133,000 was almost evenly divided between Tammany
and the County Democracy, it was clear that the Republicans, who
had   polled   90,000   for   Blaine,   could have elected their entire
county  and  judiciary  ticket.     That  party  could  have  bad  the
Mayor, Comptroller, president of the Board of Aldermen, and all
:he judges chosen.    They would also have had control for the com-
ng two years of the Commission of Estimates and Apportionment,
1 lut O'Brien for private reasons of his own deliberately threw the city
I ilection into tbe bands of the Democrats, although a strong local
, ;icket would have helped the Blaine vote.    It seems tbat the
'] Republican party of this city exist for the benefit of the machine





of which Mr. O'Brien is tbe bead. There must be tens of thou¬
eands of Republicans who are incensed at this treachery of their
leader, but in all the multiplicity of daily papers, tbere is uot one
ihat bas voiced their indignation. Is not this Theodore Roosevelt's
chance? Why should he not do in New York what Mayor Low
bas dono in Brooklyn, that is, bead the young men and honest men
of all parties for an attack upon the corrupt political machines
now under the control of our local politicians, the most utterly
consciencelsss and despicable of which is tho one engineered by
"Johnny" O'Brien.





The Philadelphia Water Department, under tbe advico of Prof
Albert R. L'?eds, the chemist of the Stevens lastitute, is trying an
e.xperiment wbich wo commend to the attention of our Aqueduct
Commission. The Schuylkill and Delaware Rivers, upon which the
Quaker City depends for ils drinking water, have become fouled by
the sewerage and waste of the cities and factories on their banks.
To bring purer wt'ter from a distance would be a work of lime and
great expense, bo a process koown as aeriation is being tested. This
is simply tho forcing of air into the water. The oxygen thus sup¬
plied converts the pollutions into harmless oxidized products and
the wholesomeness of water is thus restored. It ia hy this procesa
that water is naturally purified. A running stream rids itself of
impurities by contact with changing air. Tbe Thames, for instance,
which is foul because of the sewerage of Loudon, purifies itself by
aeriation so thoroughly that in ten miles below that city ii; is suffi
ciently oxygenized for drinking purposes.





Why should not tbis hint be taken by our Aqueduct Conimission
Why go to enormous expense to exclude the health-giving oxygen
and confine the water in its passage all the way from Croton Lake
to the city of New York ? True, tbe water is exposed to the air in
tbe reservoirs, but standing water stagnates; it should bo kept in
motion to become pure. Of course, the plans for tbe aqueducts
already made involve tbe exclusion of light and air from the water
but in view of recent knowledge on this subject it is a stupid and a
costly blunder to enclose the water the entire distance.





The Cattle Ranch Speculation.

We are rarely without an active speculation m some specialty in
this country. Now the fever breaks out in stocks, then in grain or
cotton, and further along iu mining or petroleum ; but the specu¬
lative fever of the immediate future promises to be in the shares of
ranch companies owning pasture and stock in the Far West. As
this new development of speculative enterprise affects land, hith¬
erto almost unsalable, it is a matter which should be seriously con¬
sidered by tbe real estate interests of this city, and especially by
the promoteis of the Eeal Estate Exchange, which is to be opened
early in 1885,

It has been well known that cattle raising iu the extreme West
has been a lucrative business for many years past. As tbe pasture
on government land has cost little or nothing, a four-year old steer
could be raised in Texas for less tban iJ4. At the railway station it
would sell for from §18 to '$20. If driven north from Texas through
the Indian Territory, aud fed for a season in the pastures of tho
middle and upper zones of the West, the cattle would almost
double in value, and would get rid of the fever whicli is almost
universal iu the Texas herds. This profitable business has created
a class of cattle kings who are uow consolidating their power by
organizing into great corporations, owning multitudes of herds and
controlling vast quantities of pasture land from the Gulf of Mexico
to the Canada borders. But the cattle interests just now find
themselves embarrassed. The country has been settled to a certain
extent. Farmers and railroads have encroached upon their free
pastures. The settlers in Kansas object to having droves of cattle
sent through their private property. The demand is made that the
cattle be transported by rail, but this is objected to because the
Texas fever clings to the animal unless it is driven gradually north,
and its condition naturally improved by the change of climate,
food and water,

Po tbe cattle kings have been holding great conventions iu Chi¬
cago and St. Louis. Tbey are not at all modest. They ask tlio
government to befriend them—to assign them lands.free ol cost—
to give (hem lakes and rivers for watering their stock; b^jt tho
boldest deniand of all is for a great free cattle trail len miles wide
and extending from Central Texas to the Canada frontier. There
is to be a powerful lobby iu Wasbiugton this winter to urge upon
Congress legislative patronage for thi^ great catlio interest: but
these great rjuich corporations have a grievance agamst the rail¬
ways and a just one. The latter have discjiminated against the
eastern-bound dressed beef sent in refrigerator cars. The trans¬
portation of live cattle is most protitable to railroad companies, and
one of the perquisites of their managers is their personal interests
in stock yards and abattoirs on the ALlauLic coast. The cattlemen
declare that they must have justice in rates on dressed beef. If
they should win it would be a great ailvautage to tbe Eastern
people, who   will   be   thus   enabled to   use   the   comparatively





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