June 20,1891





Record   and   Guide.





979







^                  >\              ESTABLISHED ^ !WW?H aW^ 1868.

De/oteD to RpA.L Estate . Suiioif/c "AR.ct^iTE:cTjR| .KouseHold DeqoratioiJ.

BU51(JE3SAtJDTHEME&0fGESElV-l-llJT£l\E51

PRICE, PER YEAR IN ADVANCE, SIX DOLLARS.

Published every Saturday.
fELKPHONE       -      ,      -      -      Cortlandt 1370,
Communications sbould be addressed to

C. W. SWEET.  14 &  i6 Vesey St.

J. 1. LINDSEY, Siimiess Manager.





Vol. XLVII





JUNE  20,  1891.





No. 1,314





NOTICE OF REMOVAL.

TJie publication offices of The Record and Guide have been
■removed to Nos. 14 and 16 Vesey street, ove>- The Mechanics' and
TVaders' Exchange, a fern feet west of Broadway.





TRE NEW ARCHITECTURAL QUARTERLY.

The Architectueal Record, a quai-terly illustrated magazine
which will be published by The Record and Guide, u-ill be issued
early in July. The purpose is to make it pre-eminently the maga¬
zine of architecture and the allied arts in this country. No expense
or pains will be spared to accomplish this. The contributors to the
magazine will be the best known writers of the day, the illustrations
will be of the highest order, the typography and printing the best
procurable. The office of -publication will be at Nos. 14 and 16
Vesey street, to i hich address suhscriptions and advertisements may
now be forwarded.

There will be no better medium than The Architectural Record
for advertisers ivhn wish to reach the architects of the United States
and Canada, as well as the great part of the general public, who
are interested to some extent, in the construction, decoration ai.d
furnishing of buildings. The price of the magazine hasbeenput at
35 cents a copy or $1.00 a year, and readers of The Record and
Guide who wish to subscribe may do so by sending their names aiid
addresses to us on a postal curd. The scope of this magazine will be
so wide and many of the subjects it will deal with of such general
interest, that it will be quite as valuable and entertaining to the
builder, the real estate agent, the property-owner and the intelli¬
gent mechanic as to the architect. It will keep them in touch with
the best that is being thought and done in the art which is not only
most closely related to their special business interests, but the one
which, of all others, is the most practical and has certainly the
directest influence upo7i ordinary daily life.

THE stock market found at least one reasonable cause, in the
renewal gold exports, for its Muctuationa this week. Previ¬
ous to that rise and fall were alike uncomprehensible. For some
days pricea moved under the lead, it would be inadmissable to say
underthe influence of Chicago Gae. What could better indicate
tlie paucious and professional character of the market ? Yet Chi¬
cago Gas was in the van of more than one movement each way.
Consequently, the market advanced because Chicago had forced
the Gas Company into giving it a good bargain on its gas supply,
and with admirable inconsistency declined because the Gaa Com¬
pany had not also secui-ed to itself an equally good bargain. With
what seemed a more marked inconsistency still, prices ref used to
budge on the announcement of the reduction of the
Bank of England rate to three per cent. a de¬
cline of one per cent, although following a like
reduction made only a fortnight before. The cause of this
hesitation was afterwards made apparent by the engagement of
$3,500,000 of gold for shipment to France by to-day's steamer. This
unexpected renewal of the gold export movement revives the
anxiety as to the condition of affairs abroad, the gold being required
in the settlement of balances. It caused the throwing over of some
long stocks bought during the last week or ten days in the expecta¬
tion of an advance and the withdrawal from the market of insiitu-
tions which had been offering them money. Awaiting
developments theie is likely to
most probably with weakness.
talking about buying on wheat
out their money in consequence.
only becaude general trade is bad.
country do not seem to have disposed of their spring goods, and
merchants in good standing are asking for renewals. If general
trade should pick up, it will simply mean a period of very tight





be dullness, accompanied
People    are     doing    more

prospecta tlian putting
The   loan   maiket   is   easy,

The retailers all over   the





money with no Treasury &uiplu8 to fall back upon.   So that in
spite of good crop prospects, speculators may well be cautioiia.





THB further reduction of the Bank of England rate of dis¬
count indicates that tbe Governors of that institution are
relieved of any apprehensions as to the ability of the present large
reserve of the Bank to stand even the very heavy demands which
will be made upon it during the coming few montbs. It ought to
go very far towards restoring tbe conBdence of the financial public
in the prospects, and lead to a greater freedom in operations, both
for speculation and investment. Tbe recent apprehensions have
been useful in again forcing into prominence the necessity in timea
of troul le of some co-operation between the large joint-stock banks
and the Bank of England in maintaining rates. Alone the Bank of
England, except during a few months, when levenue collections
tend to give it control of the market, is almost powerless; but that
institution, together with half a dozen of tbe largest joint-stock con¬
cerns, control about 33 per cent of the deposits of the United Kingdom
and consequently could prevent the beating down of rates. That
something will eventually be done maj be gathered from the fact
that at a recent meeting of the representatives of tiie London joint
stock bankp, the private banks and Scotch banks, the principle of
coroperating with tlie Bank of England was approved. From a
list recently published, comparing the present prices of Argentine
securities with those of January, 18SI0, it is shown that the depre¬
ciation on the national and provincial loans amounted to £83,500,-
000; and it is further estimated that if to these were added the list
of railway and trading companies in which England has
embarked, a depreciation of nearly double the above
amount would be disclosed. Meanwhile, prospecta in Argen¬
tina are not a whit more encouraging tban they were
a few months ago. In Paris the prices of securities aie steady and
strong. The Chamber of Deputies is continuing its discussion of the
detailsofthe new tariff, and when a choicehad to be made between
the duties of the government and tbose of the committee, it has al¬
ways have adopted the higher scale. In Berlin money is easy, but
prices are still shading off. Tlie hope that the market might im¬
prove and unite activity with a recovery of valuea ia being grad¬
ually abandoned even by the most sanguine, Thp attention of
Austrian financiers is atill concentrated on the discussion which has
arisen over tbe proposed resumption of specie payments. The Fi¬
nance Minister of Austria, Dr. Steinbach, in a recent speech, de¬
clared unequivccatly that there-establishment of specie payments
could not be brought about except by establish.ng a pure gold
standard. He dwelt also on the obstacles to tbe realization of ihe
purpose, but was inclined to think the project entirely feasible. In
spite of the excellent Austrian and Hungarian harvests of laat year,
the storehouses of that country are pretty well drained. Tbie year,
if the moderate i;xpectations at present entertained are fulfilled,
thepr-'-duction will just prove sufficient for the consumption of the
monarchy, so that if Germany is obliged to suspend her corn duties,
it is the American trade that will reap the principal benefit.





THE difficulty at preeent found of selling in open market at
satisfactory pricea large parcels of real estate emphasizes the
conclusion we have recently drawn from our tables of real estate
operations ; the conclusion, viz., tbat large investors have no money
to lock up at the present time, Witl in the last few weeka four
parcels, all of them held at more than $100,000, have been offered
on tho Exchange oniy to be bid in. The flrst of these, No. 72 Wall
street, 28x40, was withdrawn at a bid of $90,000, the owners hold¬
ing it at §110,000. Last week, No, 40 East 14th street, forming au
L with No. 79 University place, and containing 4,368 square feet.
met the samefate, Altbough rented until 1900 at from $16,-
500 to $18,000 per annum, tbe largest offer which could
Le obtained was $847,000, During the past week the
owners of two other large parcels were equally unsuccessful
in obtaining what they considered to be a fair valuation for their
property. No, 68 Broadway, running through to No. 17 New street,
a little over a full city lot in size, was bought in at $370,000. Tbe
building is five storiea in height, and when full, rents for $24,500 ;
but it must be remembered tbat the value of such a plot, improved
wilh only a five-story building, ia not detejmined by the amount of
return which the small building brings in. The owners are said
to bave been holding it at over $5u0,000. During the past week,
also, a plot with burnt buildings thereon, measuring 137.10 on
Eank street, x 1.7.6 on Greenwich street, x 123.3 in rear, x 763 on
Hudson street, was withdiawn at a bid of $169,000, Thatthe
inability of the owners to obtain satisfactory prices is not due to
any lack of confidence in New York real estate is sufficiently well
shown by tbe fact that smaller parcels of thesame kind of property
on Murray street and Maiden lane have lately sold at fair valua-
ations. Then many of tlie sales of unimproved property in the
northern wards have been phenomenally successful, showing that
there ia no lack of amall purchasers. The reason for the lack of
demand for these expensive parcels is obvious.    The financial pros-