September 28, 1888





Record  and  Guide.





1129







DeV&JEI) to KE^L EsrWE, BuiLOIf/c Ap-Cif ITECTJI^E .HoilsnfOlD UEODiVTlOtJ.

BUsiiJess aiIdThemes of Ge;Jei^I Ij>(T€i\esi





ESTABLISHED-^fAARpHSIti^ 1868.^







PRICE, PER VEAR IIV ADVANCE, SIX DOLLARS.

Fid)lished every Saturday.
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Vol. XLII.





SEPTEMBER 22, 1888.





No. 1,071





The past has been a lively week in WaU etreet. The "bears"
had their innings during- the first few days, due to the paeaing of
the St. Paul dividend, but they misunderstood the situation and
oversold the market. The "bulls" saw their chance and turned
upon them in St. Paul, Northwest and Lake Shore, and gored the
unfortunate "bears" unmercifully. The market is undeniably
strong, due very largely to confident and persistent European
buying. It is foreigners who have made our market for the last
two years, and they are now buying more eagerly than ever. This
fact, with our immense corn crop and the deficient harvests abroad,
would seem to insure a bull campaign from this time forth iu our
stock market; but it would be a very serious matter if anything
should happen to scare European investors and speculators. They
have had excited markets abroad for a long time and a collapse is

among the possibilities.

-----------a-----------

The passage by Congress of an appropriation of $100,000 to stamp
out the yellow fever plague may not be constitutional, according to
the strict constructionists; but, nevertheless, it was the right thing
to do. Congress is empowered to provide for the general welfare,
and there is a natiu-al instinct in all nation to meet national perils
by \^ielding the power of the government to overcome them. The
civii war was waged on the part of the nation without any con¬
stitutional warrant. We are taking the same attitude towards
pestilence, and were a famine to tkfeaten us there would be no
hesitancy in using exti-a constitutional powers to relieve the suffer¬
iug and feed the hungry. Parchment provisions in such cases are
like the weak strands with which Dehlah bound Samson. The
yellow fever has reached the iiroportions of a national calamity; it
threatens to paralyze business through aU the summer States, and
will undoubtedly affect the value of Southern securities. It will
put a stop also for a time to the movement of the great army of
invalids from the Northern States, who periodically seek winter
homes in the semi-tropical regions south of Virginia and along the
gulf coast. This wiU interfere with the habits of hundreds of
thousands of families, which usually try to escape the rigors of our
Northern climate in midwinter. It also seems pretty certain that
our Nortbei-n sanitariums have a prosperous season ahead. It will
be found that Lakewood, Long Branch, Cape May, Fortress Monroe
and other winter resorts will be crowded as they never have been in
recent yeai-s.

The house of Morgan & Co., of London, must be building up a
gigantic fortune for the head of the concern. It has reorganized
the West Shore, the Reading, the Baltimore & Ohio, the Chesapeake
& Ohio very successfully, and iias made enormous profits in each
case. The last enterprise proposed is the rescuing of the St. Paul
corporation from the speculative directors who have given that
property so bad a name in financial circles. There is a suspicion
that tbe Vanderbilts may _be back of the new Morgan deal so as
to get an awkward competitor, for business in the West out of the
way. Intrinsically the St. Paul property is a splendid one. It
embra.ces five thousand miles of road, most of which is located in a
fertile and growing country. Its stock and bonded debt does not
average much over $30,000 a mile. Properly managed its common
stock ought to sell for par and pay over 6 per cent, interest. But what
we started out to say was, that vast as have been the fortunes accu¬
mulated by other bankers they will be all dwarfed by the enormous
ones heaped up by the London house of J. S. Morgan & Co. The
history of this great banking establishment is another instance of
the tendency of all modern business to become concentrated in one
great concern. A quarter of a century ago the jn-oflts now made
by Banker Morgan would have been distributed among twenty or
thii-ty rival houses. Legislative enactments intended to oppose this
tendency toward the concentration of wealth in few hands or
in Ti'usts will prove as futile as the famous and perhaps mythical
" Pope's bull against the comet."





be chosen on the sixth of nest November will hare tm unuBual
amount of patronage, and the local " bosses " are determined this
time to divide the offices in the way that will do them the most
good. Tammany has undoubtedly more votes than either the
County Democracy or the Republicans, and if Abram Hewitt is out
of the way they could easily elect some one pledged to divide tho
offices up among the " faithful." The Republican " machine" will,
as usual, be run in the interest of Tammany. It will have a sti-aight
ticket on the plea that it will help tbe National ticket; but on election
day the "Dummy" candidate put up for Mayor will be slaught¬
ered. To flank their rivals the weakened County Democracy pro¬
pose to run Abram Hewitt, hoping that there will be enough Repub¬
licans and Independent Democrats to elect him over the Tammany
candidate. The Sun warmly supports Hewitt, probably because
he is not on good terms with President Cleveland; but the World
newspaper, the Irish people and many of the active labor leaders
are opposed to Hewitt. Altogether it looks as if we are to have a
mighty interesting municiijal canvass.





The local politicians are hard at work to secure the Mayoralty
prize in the coming election.   The chief magisti-ate of this city to





The story of Confidential Clerk Bedell's swindling operations, as
told in yesterday's papers, is simply startling. Tbe magnitude of
the thefts, coupled to the fact that tbe work was done in the
office of one of the leading firms of real estate lawyers—Shipman,
Barlow, Larocque & Choatti—almost takes tbe breath away of any¬
one who knows how easily it all might have been prevented. With¬
out any circumlocution the firm could have prevented Bedell's tliiev-
ing by subscribing to The Record and Guide, which publishes a
list of all the mortgages recorded in New York and adjoining coun¬
ties. It would have been au easy task for one of the firm to check
weekly the mortgages which had been sent to be recorded with those
actually recorded, and a failure to find one or more would have
led to the discovery of Clerk Bedell's plan. It seems to have
been easy for Bedell to forge the seals and sig-natures of
Registers, Commissioners of Deeds and Notaries to the mortgages,
to give them every appea- ance of regularity, but it would have been
impossible for him to seciu-e the pubhcation in these columns
of the fraudulent mortgages, unless they were actually recorded,
without immediate detection. This leads us to the point where wc
are in a position to say, after reading tbe names of tbe builders
used by Bedell in liis nefarious work, that if the mortgages had
been pubhshed the forgeries would have been discovered at once,
as many of the persons are close readers of The Record and Gdide,
and even if they were not, the fact of their mortgaging property
would bave been brought to their notice by material men, who
watch our columns to keep posted concerning their customers'
standing. Messrs. Shipman, Barlow, Larocque & Choate have
saved six dollars a year for several years by not taking The Record
AND Guide and they have lost over a quarter of a miUion dollars.

The following letter from Lawyer Charles H, Glover, relative to
forged deeds, explains itself:

fobged deeds.

99 Nassau Street, New York,    I
Sept. IOtb, 1874. f
Editor Real Estate Record:

Sir—I think it my duty to say to you that it was by meaus of your pub¬
lications alone that my clieuts and myself were put upou inquiry in respect
to the fraud recently attempted upon tne estate of Isaac Young by the
recording of a forged deed.

I have been a subscriber to and a reader of The Record from the time of
its first issue, and have found it very useful. And it was in consequence of
a prompt persual of your uumber ol last Satm-day that I was able to detect
the crime which had beeu committed, and to put the officers of justice upon
the track of tbe criminals.

Had it not been for your publication the deed would have been obtained
from the Register's oflice, my clients' title would have been clouded by ifc,
and we should have bad no duo whatever to fche perpetrators of the wrong.

I am, youi' obedient servant,

Charles H. Glover.

After reading the foregoing letter oui- readers can judge for them¬
selves as to the value derived from a careful perusal of om- columns
containing conveyances, mortgages, etc., as well as plainly see that
the statement as to how the Bedell forgeries could have beeu

avoided is not exaggerated.

_----—m----------

If it is true, as foreign rumors intimate, that Prince Bismarck is
about to resign his position as Prime Minister of the German
Empire, it means that the young Kaiser proposes to do the ruling;
himself or has determined upon a line of pohcy which the Chan¬
cellor disapproves, The great reviews, mock battles and the sti'icter
discipline of the German army can have but one meaning. The
new Emperor has determined upon war, and the contemplated
blow has not the approval of Bismarck. It seems hardly likely that
hostilities will break out before winter, but it is safe to assume
that the great armies of Europe will be in motion by next spring.
If this forecast as to the foreign situation is correct, it would be
well for Wall street to be careful. Dm-ing the past year there has
been a lively speculation in railroad and bank sliares on the leading
bourses of Europe; indeed, our own market has been sustained by
the heavy purchases of foreign capitalists. While a foreign war
would eventuaUy benefit the trade of this country, its first effect
would be to create a panic on our stock exchange, for, not only
would European buying cease, but there would be a flood of Aaaeri^