March SS, 1890





Record  and  Guide.





397









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Vol. XLV.





MARCH 32, 1890.





No. 1,149.





The advance in prices on the stock market was checked by the
announcement of the resignation of Prince Bismarck, and a
decline waa forced upon other announcements affecting trade
conditions at home. The overwhelming importance, politically,
of the change which has just been consummated in the German
administration had naturally a very large influence on the Euro¬
pean Exchanges; and while it may not signify any change of
policy on the part of Germany towards her neighbors, European
financial circles will want to be assured of tbat before making any
decided movements. The home market ie, of course, affected to
the extent of the selling of American securities abroad; but of
this there has been no great volume, and it cannot have any great
duration, :u any event. WaU street has been really more influ¬
enced by events at bome than by what is transpiring in Berlin,
however much the retirement of Bismarck and its probable conse¬
quences may absorb conversation. The inference of unfavorablecon-
ditlons of trade drawn from the Plummer failure; the monotonous
tone of the reports from other exchanges and commercial centres,
all teUing, for the time being, tbe same tale of dullness, and the
reports of injury to property and bustnesB by storm and flood, have
been the most important influences against the uninterrupted con¬
tinuance of the advance. The effects of all these put together have
not, however, been very serious. The Gould stocks. Union Pacific
and New England show the most prominent losses, but with those
exceptions a week has made but fractional declines in prices of the
active stocks. Some stocks, which ha^^e for some time been quiet,
have even made substantial advances, and there are sighs of move¬
ment in others which have not hitherto participated in the recent
advance. Money has been easy and an advance in rates in the near
future is not anticipated. With a continuation of easy money and in
view of the power the market has shown to meet the temporarily
unfavorable influences thrown upon it, it is natural to look for a
renewal of the upward movement and a broadening of operations.
In this event the securities of other recently reorgauized properties,
it may be hinted, will be sure to meet attention as the seciu-ities of
Atchison have already done.





A keen obserrer, now dead, made the following observations in '
respect to what we call legislative investigations, which perhaps are
worth quoting at the present time :

" Tbe exposures," said he, " whioh ai'e daily made in your newspapers of
corruption, peculation, thievery, deliberately planned and carried on for
years, as a systematic and tolerable, if not justifiable, mode of managing
public business, have come to be accepted as uiere interesting items of
news, or as occasions of wbat are called inveatigations which again waste
public money, and out of which may he made political capital. 1 was
present at one of these investigations, and I say to you solemnly tbat I
could not Cell wnieb seemed the greatest seoui'drela, the men who were
investigated or those wbo were conducting the investigation. The tone of
the whole proceeding was a mixtui'e of trickery, aud a low sort of easy
going jocoseness. Manly dignity and honor were wholly absent. I would
not have employed oue of the men on eitber side as an attorney."

Being neither politicians nor essayists, we need not use the word
" scoundrels" in respect to the investigation which we are wit¬
nessing at present; but certainly the tone, in point of dignity, is
not a whit higher than tbe one to which the writer of the above
refers. We have had the pleasaut spectacle, during the last few
days, of hearing the Mayor of our city called a " deliberate har,"
to which his Honor had no reply to make except tbe delicate one
that " You are another." We have further seen our Deputy Com¬
misaioner of Public Works—an office which in any well-governed
city would have been filled by a competent engineer—call the
counsel of a legislative committee of our sovereign State " an
unmitigated scoundrel," at which the counsel, we believe, laughed
something after the manner of Mephistopheles. The tone of the
whole proceedings cannot be better described than in the words of
the above quotation, "as a mixture of trickery and a low sort of
■easy-going jocoseuess," to which must be added that the speakers
were a little free in the use of Billingsgate. We do not wish to
reflect on the timeliness or the results of tbe investigation, but it
is not too much to ask the gentlemen concerned in it to act with





a dignity and decorum befltting the officers of a great common¬
wealth and a great municipality. A witty French writer has said
that a Mussulman could not do better than to take a Parisian
dandy in full bloom, and, pointing him out to his son, say, "Boy,
if you depart from the ways of Allah and his prophet, that is wbat
you may beco;n6." Could not a monarchist make something of a
point hy taking our present legislative investigation, and, pointing
it out to a doubtful people, say, " If you permit universal suiTrage
in lai-ge towns, that is what the result may be I "





It is becoming apparent that a vigorous and systematic attack
is being made on Tammany along the whole line, and that that
organization, which some months ago seemed to have everything
its own way, has been put in a very insecure position. Take the
World's Fair matter, for instance. It was apparent, as soon aa the
plan took form, that a successful realization of the project would
give Tammany the spending of a great deal of money, and con¬
siderable prestige; and forthwith arose an opposition which, led
by tbe Evening Poat, and assisted by the circulation of mysterious
circulars and by a number of mistakes on the part of the commit¬
tee, came very near defeating the Fair ([Derhaps did so, for all wo
know). Take, again, the rapid transit pi'oblem. Mayor Grant
sent up to Albany last year a bill which looked satisfactory, which
obtained the support of most of the press, and which, if it had
passed and had resulted in the successful solution of the difficulty,
wonld have reflected great credit on Mayor Grant and Tammany.
It failed to pass, and this session the Mayor has been checkmated
by the inti'oduction of a measure which, including some of the
main features of his bill, and remedying some of the defects, yet
names a Commission which leaves Tammany no share in any solu¬
tion which the bill may effect. Then comes an investigation by
this legislative committee. The revelations made thus far do not
reflect pei'sonally upon Mayor Grant, nor do they reveal very much
whicb was not pretty well known before—viz,, that the Sheriff's
office is managed on a plan which would bankrupt any private
business organization in a week. But, coming as they do in con¬
nection with the indictment by the Grand Jiu:y of a number of
deputy Sheriffs for bribery, the Flack matter, and the case of
Warden Keating, they show Tammany up in a very bad light. We
shrewdly suspect, furthermore, that there are plenty of seusationa
yet to come, aud that William M. Ivins, when he resigned his posi¬
tion of City Chamberlain and began this attack on Tammany, had
certain data to work upon. Be that as it may. It is quite obvious
that we have as yet only seen the beginning of what will be a long
contest—a contest which will not be finally decided until the
Mayoralty election next fall.





Our street-cleaning drama has been comparatively uninter¬
esting this week, owing to the absence of the hero. Commis¬
sioner Loomis, driven away, it appears, by an importunate and
aggi-essive, but ill-tempered clacque; for such appears to be the part
the reporters are playing in the performance. Duriug the absence
of the hero (there being no heroine) the heavy villain naturally haa
monopohzed atteution, and appears to have conducted himself
admirably after his own lights, although he has not as yet exhibited
any sign of the original conception of the part for which the man¬
ager has given him credit. How far Manager Grant is satisfied we
do not know, but there seems a disposition to be discontented on
the part of the audience, owing, we believe, as much as anything
else, to the chai'acter of the supers, who bave not been selected with
due reference to the courtly qualities which the parts require. The
play will lack interest, however, until the hero retui-ns and shows
the audience what improvements in his style of acting result from
a survey of similar exhibitions in other cities. Tbere areindications,
hoM'ever, that Manager Grant is not satisfied with his hero and
may request his resignation. We were perhaps wrong in calling
this play a drama. After all, it is the merest travesty, and not a
laughable one at that. Xn certain parts of the city there is a limited
amount of improvement discernible; but, speaking in a general
way, nothing has as yet been done sufficiently " sweeping" in cbar¬
acter to warrant any rejoicing. We maysympathizewith Commis¬
sioner Loomis in bis troubles, and with Deputy Commissioner
Hagan at the lack of fair play that is given him; hut we cannot con¬
gratulate either of them on his success.





It has beeu stated by an acute critic that the reason why so few
good books are written is that so few people who can write know
anything. In a similar spirit, though perhaps with a meaning less
paradoxical, it may be stated that the reason why New Yorkers ao
seldom get what they want ie that so few New Yorkers really want
anything. It is certainly not a pleasant thing to hang on straps.
We are quite sure tbat New Yorkers think they do not like it. An
ingenious man can find an evolutionary argument in support of
almost everything tbat exists at the present day, but we doubt if
anybody can show that arms were given to us for the purpose of
hanging on straps. Furthermore, it is to be presumed that our
property-ownera in tbe upper parts of the city would Uke to see the