July 10, 1886





The   Record and  Guide.





881





THE   RECORD   AND   GUIDE,

Published every Saturday.

191 Broadwav, 3>T. Y.

Our Teleplione Call la.....JOHN 370.





TERMS:

ONE ¥EiR, in advance, SIX DOLLARS.

Communications should be addi'essed to

€. W. SWEET, 191 Broadway.

J. T. LINDSEY, Business Manager.





Vol. XXXVIII.





JULY 10, 1886.





No. 956.





A volume which should be in the hands of every builder, con¬
tractor, architect, and owner and dealer in real estate, is now
ready and can be procured at the office of The Record and
Guide. It is a new edition of the laiu relating to buildings in
the City of New YorTe, with added matter, marginal notes and
colored engravings to illustrate the subject. It contains the law
limiting the height of dwelling-houses, also the existing Mechanics''
Lien Law. This work is edited by William J. Fryer, Jr., whose
original and well-thought-out comments give it a special value.
The volume will also contain a complete directory of architects
in New York, Brooklyn, Jersey City, Newark and Yonkers. The
book is handsomely bound in cloth, and ^s sold at the low price
of seventy-five cents.

--------•--------

Our long list of conveyances and mortgages tells the story of
the continued activity in real estate, notwithstanding the fact
that we are in the midst of what is usually the dullest season
of the year. The bull market in Wall street continues, but the
buying is not so general or confident as it was. There ought
to be a set back, but with easy money, good crops and excellent
prospects for the fall, nothing but a very startling disaster would
give the bear party very large profits. The general trade of the
country seems to be fairly good. There has been some damage to
the spring wheat crop, but not enough to warrant the flurry in the
price of wheatXin Chicago early this week. We will have enough
of grain and some to spare for Europe.





which demand   a eolution from   the present race of  English
statesmen.





Ireland will have no separate Parliament this year, perhaps
never. Our readers will bear witness that The Record and Guide
was about the only paper in New York which predicted that Home
Rule, as presented by Mr. Gladstone, would be voted down at the
polls in England, Scotland and Wales. The final result has proved
that the combined press of New York was mistaken as to the real
temper of the voting public of the " Tight Little Island." It Is now
apparent that had it not been for the extraordinary personal popu¬
larity of William E. Gladstone the opponents to Home Rule would
be in an overwhelming majority in the next Parliament.





What are we to expect of the future ? The Tories will probably
form a new government, with the Marquis of Salisbury as Premier.
They may not have a majority over Liberals, Whigs and Radicals,
but the two latter factors will probably agree to tolerate the Tory
Cabinet in conducting the legitimate business of the country pro¬
visionally ; the Irish and the Land questions to be kept in the back¬
ground for the present. Mr. Gladstone would naturally decline to
head an administration after being so signally beaten in an appeal
to the country. The new Parliament will be short-lived in all proba¬
bility, for the Radicals, under Chamberlain, could never afford to
countenance or in any way tolerate for any length of time a Tory
government. The federative plan, an outline of which we gave
last week, will doubtless be brought to the fore by the Radicals aa
a compromise measure; but there is no likelihood of that or any
similar scheme being accepted just yet by the Parnellites or Tories.





The future of England and Ireland is very gloomy. So far Par-
nell has been able to keep the more turbulent of his followers in
order. They have stood evictions, murderous outrages by the
Orangemen, and the insults of the Tories, without making any
reprisals; but the dynamiter may again come to the fore. If throw¬
ing tufts of grass is ineffectual to make an impression on the Eng¬
lish public, stones may be tried. A resort to coercion to repress
disorder will discredit any government who undertakes it, and
this is the one peril which confronts a Tory administration. Cer¬
tainly matters look very dark so far ae the immediate future of tha
domcstio politics of Great Britain is concerned. Still, the states¬
men of England are very able men. Tories, Liberals, the Irish, the
Whigs and the Radicals all have at their command the services of
leaders of signal ability, and no doubt a solution will finally be
zeaclied, not only of the Irish, but of the land and other problems





The Star adopts an idea often presented in these columns. It
urges a movement to consolidate New York, Kings, Richmond
and Westchester counties into one municipality, to be called the
City of Manhattan. This will come about sometime, for all great
cities naturally draw to themselves the surrounding suburbs ; but
the local politicians, especially those of Brooklvn, will naturally
fight against the union of the populations around New York Bay,
as the effect would be to deprive tbem of their local prominence.
Once consolidated. New York would rank as the third, if not the
second, city in the world in point of population and wealth. The
Star shows great, good sense in appropriating this suggestion of
The Record and Guide.





Everything portends a hot summer. The unusual moisture of
the spring months was due to the earlier melting of the ice in the
arctic regions. Then from the statistics kept by experts, two, if
not three, warm summers are now due. The grass and grain crops
in the Middle and Eastern States and in the West on the line south
of Chicago wiU be unusually good; but in the Northwest and
throughout the spring wheat country there will be deficient sum¬
mer crops. It is too early as yet to make any prognostications
touching the corn crop. Hot summers, however, and late falls are
usually followed by heavy crops of com.





It does not seem likely that the appropriation for $1,000,000 to
improve New York harbor wiU pass the present Congress. The
local press is so provincial that it opposes all improvements by the
general government for other sections of the country, and hence
Congressmen from the interior steadily vote down everything that
will advantage this neighborhood. The defeat of the appropriation
for completing the Bartholdi Statue tells the story of the resentment
felt towards this city; yet if our newspapers or our Congressmen
could rise to the height of great argument they would see that
every river and harbor improvement made east of the Rocky
Mountains was an indirect if not a • direct benefit to the trade of
the metropolis. All the roads of the then civilized world led to
Rome, and every better means of intercommunication in this
country swells the commerce and adds to the profits of this city.
But no matter what the improvement, our newspapers always howl
" job" and play into the hands of the Randalls and the Holmans,
who oppose all improvements of any kind.





Although tariff reform is dead so far as this session is concerned,
there is some hope that a few reforms may be effected next winter.
All that the country is prepared for is an addition to the free list,
some abatement of the most onerous impost duties and a rectifi¬
cation of our Custom House machinery. The administration of
affair.s in this and other ports is in a state of confusion, which
advantages only the dishonest importers and the lawyers and
brokers who wax fat by the " glorious uncertainty " of the laws
and decisions affecting imported goods. The fact that there will
be no radical changes in our tariff or internal duties until next
winter, if even then, will help the trade of the country next fall.





Readers of newspapers would do well to be cautious in accepting
the statements published with regard to the Panama Canal. The
American public occupy the position towards that enterprise which
the British public held towards the Suez Canal. The best English
engineers called the latter a " French folly," and said it could
never be completed, and if it was it would be of no advantage to
France or the commerce of the world. But the Suez Canal was
finally finished, and has proved to be a mighty factor in readjust¬
ing the trade between the Orient and the Occident. We have
always held that the Panama Canal would be finally completed,
though, we believed it would cost, as such enterprises always do,
vastly more money than the original estimates called for. When
it is finished the Panama Canal will have consequences even more
important than the changes effected by the opening of the Suez
Canal. For one thing, it will alter, vitally, the foreign policy of
the United States. We shall be forced, by an instinct of self-
preservation, to take our place among the nations of the earth.
We shall then have sea-coast fortifications, steel war ships, and
plenty of them, for that canal must be controlled from Wash¬
ington, and not from Paris, London or Berlin. But the current
statements in our daily press, as to the Panama Canal, are as short¬
sighted as the vaticinations of the same journals have been
respecting the certainty of Home Rule in Ireland.





In the first six months of 1886 there were 1,755 miles of new rail¬
way track laid in the United States. As the railway building of
the last six months usually doubles that of the first, railway
experts say that nearly 6,000 miles of new track will be laid this
year.   In 1855 only 3,300 miles were laid, and in 1884 only 3,825