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â– Ansiist 11, 1894
Record and Guide.
193
\
ESTASUSHED ^ M.AR,CH 21V> 1668.
Div&teD to F^lEstaie,Building Architecture.HouseiIoidDeqquatioi*,
B^;sl^/Ess ^^b Themes of Gsi-Iei^I 1Ktcr.es7 .
PRICE, PER YEAR IN ADVANCE, SIX DOLLARS.
Published every Saturday.
TcLEi'Ho.vE,......Cortlandt 1370
Communications should be addressed to
C, W, SWEET, 14-16 Vesey Street.
J, 1. LINDSEY. Business Manager.
Brooklyn Office, 276-282 Washingtox Street,
Opi'. Post Office.
" En leredal Uie Post-office at New Tork.y. T,, as second-class matter."
Vol. liv.
AUGUST 11, 189-1.
No. 1,378
For additional Brooklyn matter, see Brooklyn Department immediately
followiuQ Yew Jersey records (poifc 213).
WHETHER slimiilated or not bv an autit-ipation of an entl
to tarifl distiission, business continues to improve iu
nearly all the jaeat lines. Jobbers report a sustained improve¬
ment in demaud. Mauafactnrers of woolen and other gooda in
the .'Janie lines are in receipt of a satisfactory number of duiiH-
cate orders. Stoclcs of pig inm are decreasing, notwith-standing
tliat the furnaces are increasiog tlieir output. These facts are
important and eucoiiragiug:, especially as they are accompanied
by evidence that retailers have uot yet departed from their
policy of limiting orders to actual needs. So far there are no
signs of stocking up, con.sequently the improvement in demand
represents the wants of the consumer almo.st entirely. In the
stock market the securities of the old lliehmond Terminal and
of the Soutliern Kailroad, which is to take its place, are tbe
features, and will coutiuue to be so as long as general conditions
ave favorable to an advance. Crop news continues to atfect the
gi-ain market and the grain-carrying roads. No doubt serious
damage has been done all louud ; this should be felt most iii the
prices for graiu, as it, is a question whether the advance in those
prices will not operate to offset a large part of the losses in
freights that the shorter crop will entail ou the railroads.
So far people who liave goue short of the Grangers on crop news
in tlic past week have not made much money even on papei-, and
as the short interest is estimated to be very large any attempt at
covering should put up quotations oonsiderably. AVall Street
interprets recent tarift developments to mean the failure of the
Wilson Bill, but while that might be the best thing that could
occur at tho moment, it must not be forgotten how the adminis¬
tration came out of the silver muddle at a time wbeu it looked
U) outsiders as if tot:il repeal was impossible and compromise
the wisest coni'se. The offer of free sugar from the .Senate Cju-
ferees lias about it such an appearance of desperate bluff that it
gives ground for the suspicion that they feel their position grow¬
ing coiitenable.
CORE A, or Korea as the Bureau of Statistics chooses to spell it,
does not do a very large trade with the Uuited States,
according to the report of that bureau. Her exports to us in the
year ended June 30, 1893, were, valued at .^79; the previous
year .she had eent us ipGOS worth of goods, all free of duty. She
is not specially reported a.s taking anything from us, conse-
quently all we send is probably missionaries. Indirectly we
probably do some trading in Oorea, through China and Japan,
but our commercial interest in the country is very
small. The xmpleasantness that has broken out betweeu
Chiuaand Japan over this peninsula is regarded as likely to
bring the coutestiug nations into the European markets ;is bor¬
rowers of money and purchasers of .supplies, and iu that way
help to relieve the stagnation in business. Neither Japiin uor
China has any foreign debt to speak of. The former's oulstaud-
ing extei-nal loans amount to only $3,000,000 and the hitter's to
$-5,000,000. The English investor is counting the co.st of
investments in American breweries, where indeed the losses
have been very heavy, but it is wrong to put all the blame
for this on Americans, because the market here gave
good indications tbat the properties were not what
they were represented to be, and the deceits that
were practised were mostly devised by the company
mongers within call of Thieadneedle street. It is probable that
the exception favoring cotton goods from tbe general import
duty in India will be soon removed. The 5 per cent duty on all
cotton imported will not only help the Indian treasury, bnt also
tbe manufacturers of cotton goods there. Berlin and Vienna
have both seen more, activity on their bour,ses as a result of
improving comiitions, though there is very little uew iu that
direction that can. be specifically mentioned outside of the
uudcistandiiig Ihat tho Austrian government bas acquired all
the gold it needs to carry out the reform of (he currency. 'l"ho
people of Austria-Huugary seem to have the same ridiculous
objection to the use of silver on account of its weight
!is our own people have, and a movement is on foci
lookiug to the retention of part of the small bills. Money
is plentiful everywhere, and the predicfciou is renewed
by European financial .journals that gold should come this way
soon. The proposed uew Western Australian loau of $7,250,-
000 brings out the fact that that province has a debt of ovei
$200 per capita, which-vvjll bo increased about $100 a liead if
the new loau is negotiated. What this means will be better
iiuder.stood when it is stated that the debt of Great Britain is
only about $00 per head of population. The heat of the foreign
holders of Greek bonds is explained by the reiiort that Premier
Tricoupis' plau of settlcineut witli them is to scale down interest
nearly 70 per cent to make a sinking fund out of which to com -
pnUorily retire the bonds themselves.
A Danger Point in Keal Estate Ooerations.
TIIERE is a point in our system of real estate operations thai
is insufficiently guarded. Pour or hve cases have comt-
under our observation recently inwhich serious loss has bee»
incurred because tho parties interested failed to accurate! v
locate the property. In some eases survevors were employed
and in others theproperty was taken by mere oral desiguatior.
The case which was reported in December last, in Bradhurst
avenue, where a woman bought, or supposed she was Imying, an
unfinished flat, and learned to her dismay after she had Iiuished
it that the ]iroperty actually couveyed to her was a vacant lot
nearby, is still fresh in everybody's recollection.
A year or so ago, in a board meeting of a corporation which
makes loans on real estate security, one of the directois
remarked that it would be au easy matter for a designing per.son
to swindle all such corporations through this unguarded poiuf.
The same corporation has jnst been made the victim of just suc!i
an operation. -'V buildinu-loau was made to a woman who had
recently purchased a lot at auction. She supposed she had pui -
chased lot No. 4.7, and made her application for a loan accord¬
ingly. Tbe deed she received was for lot No. 49 andthe con¬
veyancer tor the corporatiou made the mortgage accordingly.
The woman, all unwittingly, had her builders put up the twj
Inmses ou lot No. 47, and the appraisers for the association, als:.
unwittingly, certified to the progress of the work and gave cei â–
tifieates for payments on tho loan until all was paid and tbij
houses completed. Then the real owner of lot No. 47 made
him.self: known, aud, baving the advantage of the woman and
the corporation, made theui pay him a fancy price for his lot.
In this case tho mistake was clearly without design. But in
the same manuer it would have been quite possible for the
owner of two or more lots to borrow money for building pur¬
poses on one of thera. aud to put np his buildiug ou oue of the
others, thus leaving the corporatiou with avacant lot as security
for its loan. Thc^e cases would be more difficult of accomplish¬
ment in a densely-populated section than they would iu tbu
suburbs, where there is land enough to juggle with. But eveu in
the most densely built-up sections there is room for expensivu
mistakes, as has just been demonstrated in New York.
A tirm of bnilding operators, of considerable experience in
such operations, some time ago began the construction of a largo
building in the dry-goods district, in New York City. They
engaged a surveyor, one of tho foremost of the profession, to
"survey" the plot, giving him the legal description, as con¬
tained in the deed. In time they received from him a diagram
and the plans for the buildiug were drawn and the contracts fcr
the construction given out. The mason obtainetl from thcsui-
veyor an oral designation of the corners of the plot. Thus far
the story is undisputed, hut at this point au issue of fact is
raised by the surveyor aud builder. It appears that on the
.southeast corner of tbe plot there stood a tall fragment of a
party and rear wall, forming an angle. The masou avers thai
tlie surveyor designated with his finger the inner, plastered augli;
ot this fragment of wall as the corner of the plot on winch he-
was to build, aud he went ahead accordingly. The surveyor aver?.'
that be told the builder that thisinner angle was eightinchesnortli
of the southeast corner of the plot. But the diagram of tbe
plot furnished by the surveyor did not show the fragment ct
wall in existence, and it will be generally maintaiued, wo
believe, that it should hav© shown it. However, the rear walls
of the building were found to be eight inches too far to tho
north, and encroaching that much upon the lot ad.joiuing on thii
north. Fortuoately the mistake was discovered before the
walls had risen mueh above the maiu floor. The mason is uow
engaged in tearing down the north wall preliminary to its recou-
.^tructiou, and extending the south wall to cover the gore, whicii
tapers from eight inehes in Avidth at the rear down to uothin.;
at the front of the lot. The question of re.sponsibility for tlii
mistake iu this case is an interesting one—bub too complicated