December 6; 1890





Record and Guide.





765











DD/blED TO RN- Estate • BuiUiijfc A^itectoi^ ,KousntoiD Dego^tioiI.
Bi/sit(E5s Alto Themes of CeHei^^- \mA^n

PRICE, PER YEAR IN ADYANCE, SIX DOLLARS,

PMished every Sctturday.
Telephone,           -          .          •          CJortlandt 1370.

CJommunications sbould be addressed to

C. W. SWEET, 191   Broadway
J. T, LINDSEY, Business Manager.





Vol. XLVI.





DECEMBER 6, 1890.





No. 1,186





The semi-annual Index of tki^ Kings County Conveyances, pub¬
lished in Volume 45 {from January to June, 1890) of The Record
AND Guide, is now ready and will he issued to subscribers upon
application at the office of publication. No. 191 Broadway.

THERE is no lack of money in New York at the present time;
but there is a very dangerous lack of confidence on the part
of our moneyed institutions and moneyed men. It is almost
impossible to obtain time loans, even on tbe best of security; and
everybody who can command cash is locking it up. Hence it is
that stocks have declined, and a general feeling of uneasiness has
prevailed. It is a feeling of this kind which may work great dam¬
age to interests which have not been affected by the recent panic, and
which are perfectly solvent. There has never been any reason for
the spread of the trouble into the general mercantile commimity;
but if ite effects are to be that banks will offer but narrow accom¬
modations to their customers, then these interests will most surely
be affected and injured. We learn of one house of high standing,
which, being forced to borrow $300,000, could get it only by pay¬
ing for it at the rate of 2}4 per cent a month. The better feeing in
London ought to have its influence in this city; and the monej, of
which there is no lack, should be distributed among those who
need it. The quarterly pension disbursements which begin to-day
ought to turn a good deal of cash into the channels of trade,
and supply any possible deficiency in that direction. It
is noticeable that Jay Gould's bullish utterances about
Union Pacific and an easy money market have been followed
by a drop in tbat stock of nearly ten points—a little occurrence
which we anticipated last week. At the same time, Mr. Grould has
not entered into control of the property for the purpose of running
it down; and no one need be surprised if the long-delayed Fund¬
ing bill should be pushed through the present Congress. It is
an encouraging fact that there has arisen in Liverpool a sudden
demand for cotton, which will lead to large exporte of that com¬
modity, and which, taken with the excellent domestic demand,
will make the present year exceptionally remunerative to Southem
farmers and railroads. The print cloth industry, however, is stag>
gering under very heavy stocks, whicb the declining prices make
difficult to carry. Probably the two most encouraging symptoms
are the large exporte for October and November, and heavy immi¬
gration of the present year—both of which indicate prosperity.
No one need be surprised to find us importing gold before many
months have elapsed.

----------■----------

THE reduction of the Bank of England's rate of discount to 5
per cent was hardly to be expected so soon. Scarcely two
weeks ago the London Economist predicted that the 6 per cent rate
would have to be maintained for some time to come—a time long
enough, at all events, to permit the stringency to ease so far that
the loan from the Bank of France could be repaid. That the
directors of the Bank of EIngland felt themselves secure enough to
lower the rate is an indication that the stringency was not so
intense as has been supposed. There is a very material difference
between an acute crisis and a complete collapse. The Bank of
England during the late troubles was never under a very severe
internal drain—the inevitable concomitant of a true panic; and the
trouble of the Baring Broe. was more disorganising in the possi¬
bilities it suggested than in anything wbich actually happened. It
is curious to note in this connection the small reserves of cash in
the London joint stock banks compared to that which it is thought
necessary for the banks in this city to retain. At the time of their
last report, with liabilities to the public amounting to £169,628,400,
their available cash amounted only to £17,438,700, or 10.3 per cent.
If our own banks had ever reported such a condition, nothing less
than a panic would have been the result, and if any single bank,
holding the position that National Provincial does in Lon¬
don, with liabilities to the public aggregating £39,545,800,
and with available cash amounting to only £3,014,000 or 73 per
cent, a very pretty run on the bank would have been inevitable.





The amount of cash that is required apparently for the transaction
of business^in London is amazingly small, and it is a qnestion ot our
requirements in that respect are not altogether too severe. How¬
soever that may be, the fact that the Bank of England weathered
the crisis only by a call on the Bank of France is a triumph for
bi-metalism. M, Alphonse Allard, Director of the Brussels mint,
goes so far as to say that the crisis in England will contribute to
the ultimate triumph of the double standard. The reported inten¬
tion of Mr. (Joschen to permit the Bank of England to issue small
notes against a silver guarantee foreshadows, M. Allard believes-.
a first step by England toward tbe estoblisbmebt of bi-metollism.
The Berlin market has been despondent, though by no means pan¬
icky; but it is probable that the restoration of confidence in
London indicated by the reduction of the Bank of England's rate
of discount will help to stimulate prices in Grermany. The Aus¬
trian Bourse continues undisturbed by the .troubles elsewhere,
and though prices have declined no difficulty is anticipated.





ELSEWHERE in this paper there is a statement of the plan of
the New York & New Jersey Bridge Co., as well as a few
words concerning what the larger effects of the project will be if
it should ever be carried out. There is, however, one very import¬
ant aspect of the matter, which we reserve for consideration here.
Just at present the newspapers, the officers of the company and
the public are talking much about what a great thing' it will be for
real estate when the bridge and viaduct and the great Union Depot,
etc., etc., are built and trains are running from the very heart of
New York to the uttermost parts of the continent. We do not
wish to undervalue imagination in human affairs, and we know
very well that it plays a most important part in carrying out so
large a scheme as the one which the N. Y. & N. J. Bridge Co. have
on their hands; but leaving the future to bring forth what it may.
we would like to point out one very important effect which this
project, as a project, has and will have for some time to come on
real estate.





IN laying out the route, the new bridge commissioners have
taken the map of New York and drawn what at present is an
imaginary line through blocks and blocks of property from Tlst
to 38th street. It is very easy to do that, and it is not mucb more
difficult to publish the fact when done with a flourish of trumpets;
but il ought not to be overlooked that this red line when drawn
with legislative sanction locks up and becomes, as it were,
a flaw in the title, of not only every piece of property
that it touches, but all contiguous property. No man cares to buy
real estate that may be taken from him the day after the deed
conveying it to him is signed. People do not want to acquire or
improve property that to-morrow may be facing a railroad struct¬
ure with the noises and inconveniences attacbed to it. Not so very
long ago, it will be remembered, another company in this city
undertook to project a red line almost from one end of Manhattan
Mand to the other, through iuillions of dollars worth of property.
The project was much heralded; every day we were told that
work was about to be commenced; surveyors were out " locating"
the line, and appraisers appraising the property needed. Owners
did not know when they might be called upon to surrender posses¬
sion of their houses and lots for a price which, if not satisfactory
to them, could be amended only by a long and costly legal process.
For a long time it was well-nigh impossible to sell any of the prop¬
erty over which the shadow of that project fell. Yet the first
stone has not yet been laid for the viaducts for that road, and the
iron of which its first rail is to be made has not yet been mined;
and, from all accounte, the line from London to Calcutta, to-day,
is nearer completion than it is.





NOW, of course, before any large railroad enterprise can take
shape, a great deal of projectmg and trumpet-blowing and
legislating and financiering, etc., has to be done; but, it seems to us
that it is little short of a public outrage that, while the project is
still only a project, before the first share of stock has been issued,
before the scheme has become a hard reality, wbile it is still uncer¬
tain of fulfillment, it is possible for any commission or company
to impair the commercial value of millions and millions of dollars
worth of other people's property by rendering it less marketable.
It seems to us that legal powers should not be given to these com¬
panies until tbey have obtained or are ready to guarantee the
greater part of the capital they require.





PERHAPS it would be unfair to blame President Harrison
because his message is a partisan document. It ia
only too obvious that it was written by a partisan, in a
partisan spirit, for partisan purposes. As is the case with
so many other of our "institutions," the Presidential mes¬
sage has been degraded in purpose, so tbat instead of
being a State paper it very seldom serves any higher pur¬
pose than that of tbe political pamphlet. Indeed, since the day
when the " scurvy p(ditician " usurped the position of statesman