December i8,1897.





Record and Guide





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DE^TEDîoí^LEmre.SmLDiffe A^rrE(rTyi^'>(ffljsEifou)DEOO(»iio^
Basii/Ess Aíto ĨHEfiiEs OF GeĩJer^L litoi.Esi.

PRICE     PER   YEAR     IH   ADVANCE    SiX   DOLLARS.

Pubtished every Saltirday

TKLEPHONB,             .        -        -        .             CORTLANDT  1370.

Communications ehould be addresscd to

C. W. SWEET, 14-16 Vesey Street.

J. ĩ. LLNDSET, Bnsiness Manager.

"Entere<l at the Posl-Offl.oe at New Yorh, A'^. Y., as second-class matter."





Vol. LX.





DECEMBER 18, 1897.





No.  1,553





ĨFITS FOUR PAGE SUPPLEMENl.

TRANSACTĨONS on the Stock Exclianse have fallen ofE ĩn
the past few days, a movement tĩiat is not unusual just
before the holidays. If this lessenlng of demand reacts on prices
and bringa about declines an opportunlty will be presented for
picking up stocks with a view to profiting by the resumption of
the advanee whích Is almost sure to take place early in the new
year. The outlook for business is as good as ever, the demand
for first-elass investments as strong and the railroads continue
to make most satisfaetory monthly reports. If there is any-
thlng in the situation to be deprecated it is an absurd limitation
of operations to a few prorainent issues, the prices of whĩch
are sent up away beyond anything that can be justifled by their
prospects. The buying public, as is well known, is devoid of the
sense of proportion; but when Northern Pacific preferred sells
ábove 61, because one dividend of 1% has been declared, the
thoughful observer must despair of seing the public learn any
warning lesson. It was thought that the expenence of 1893-4
had taught them something, but apparently it did not. It is not
that tne security mentioned, and others too favorably regarded,
have not a good future before them that these remarks are
made, but beeause the list contains issues, whích pay more and
are more likely to continue to make the returns on the invest-
ment, that are selling proportíonately lower. A healthier mar-
ket can be made by a respeet for these facts, and whoever is
leadĩng the buying ought to give them attention. If the pubiic
can be led by the nose, as it apparently can be, ín any direction,
wisdom would suggest that it be led in the direction of greatest
eafety and to cover the most ground. The bull movement în
the wheat market is another instance of how advances may be
overdone. The leader stands tr lose all he made last summer,
and perhaps more, because the known condîtions of the market
have changed so as to make his position untenable. It is not
only that India and Argentina are ready to export, and that the
crop prospects elsewhere are good, but the reserve in this coun-
try, which has always been a dangerous faetor, hecause of the
impossibility of estimating ĩt, appears now to be very large.





EXCHANGE seems to be turning against London pretty gen-
erally. Not only have rates on this side o£ the Atlantic
dropped to a point that suggests the early importatĩon of gold,
but that metal is in strong demand for the Continent aiso, The
rise in the price of India council bills, whieh the last offering
brought out, ought to be good for silver, as ought also the fact
that Indian money rates are rising. Business in Burope at the
moment disregards politics; otherwise instead of trade being
good and the Exchanges awakening themselves to activity, both
might hait before the tiuestion as to what all the German display
against Chlna means. To the public generally the doings at
Hamburg and Kiel appear to be buskin affairs, with Prince
Henry as a new Don Jon going through a simulated sacrifice
to gratify his brother's ambition. ĩf, as the dispatches declare,
the Kiao Chou Bay incident is ciosed to the satisfaction of Ger-
many, all the clisplay of this weeb is supremely ridicuious.
Nothing less than the intended conquest of the whole of China
would justify it, and it is even doubtful i£ that would, seeing
that China is apparentiy ready to be contĩuered by anyone who
takes the trouble to do it. The Teutonie Don Jon wilĩ not, we
are sure, be required to fight another battle of Lepanto. The
greatest hardship even the offlcial press can imagine for him is
that he must eat his Christmas eake away from Berĩin, and over
this they are shedding oceans of tears. There is before the French
Chambers a bill reducing the legal rates of interest to 3% in
eivîl matters and 4% in commerclal affalrs. A new Russían
loan for a hundred milllon rubles has been privately placed in
France.     The London financial press Is at length becoming





aware of the improved conditlon of buslness in the TJnited States,
and are pubiishiug articĩes on the increase of the net earnings
by our railroads. Hamburg-American Steamship Co.'a shares
were depressed recently on the Beriln bourse by reports of a
reduced dividend being about to be declared. The offlcial re-
port on trade and shipping presented to the Reichsrath has thĩs
significant passage, which should be read in connection with
Count Goluehowski's recent speech in Vienna on Amerlcan com-
petition:' "Thecompetition of transoceanic produce menaces agri-
culture much iess than is generaliy supposed. The real objects
of eompetition are imported not by sea, but by land, and in thia
respect the European countries are flrst concerned." Vienna,
and, of course, also the financial world of whieh it is the center,
is feeling the effects of the racial troubles by which the dual-
empire is disturhed. ' The Danube canal, which was construeted
at a vast expense and opened with magniflcent pomp a year ago,
has become unflt for navigation owing to the strength of the
current. It is one of the reraarkable facts of modern engineer-
îng that modern canals generally fail to do what Is expected of
them, the Manchester, the Baltic, the Danubian aniĩ the Corlnth-
ian eanals are all failures from one point of view or another,
and all especîaliy hecause they seem incapable of earrying steam
traffic.





TT has come to our knowledge that the owner of a piece of
*• real property, which he had eontracted to seii, has recently
met with a difficulty in conveying title through tbe fact of his
being a surety upon an auctioneer's bond. A titie company,
whieh was applied to to guarantee title declined to do so, except
subject to the disability which they concluded the fact of the
owner being on the bond created. The act under which the
bond is given is Chapter 682 of the Laws of 1897. It applles
only to cities of a million inhabitants and over, and provides that
each auctioneer shali give a bond for $2,000 with two real estate
sureties or one surety company. Regarding collection of judg-
ments on sueh bonds it states: "Seetion 6. On recovery of judg-
ment for any violation o£ this or other provisions regulatlng the
duties, rights and requirements of auctioneers, the bonds herein
provided for shall, for the purposes of execution or proceedings
upon or coilection of sueh judgments, take precedence of all
mortgages, liens, conveyances or other encumbrances affecting
or relating to the property of the sureties upon such bond."
Nothing in the aet gives the Comptrolíer power to release a
surety by taking a new bond or in any other way to discharge
the bond. It is doubted, therefore, whether a property-owner,
who wishes to convey any part of his real property, can give a
marketahle title so long as he is on such a bond. The inten-
tion of the act was, most probably, to send auctioneers to the
surety companies for their sureties. Whether that is so or not,
the owner of real estate who desires to seli will be wise, in view
of the case given above, not to go on auctioneers' bonds. It
should be mentioned, however, that the act has not yet been sub-
jected to judicial interpretation, so that there are no decisions
as to whether or not the fact of an owner being a surety on an
auctioneer's bond is a bar to his giving a marketable titie, but
that a well-known title guarantee company has espressed a
doubt upon the point is a circumstanee that ought to have
weight. 0£ course, no matter how mueh real estate is owned by
the surety, as no speciflc piece of property is given to secure the
bond, it is all equaĩly affected by this doubt.





THE isolation from popular supervision or interest of the
greater part of the law-making of the coun-
try is oue of the gravest dangers that beset the
Republic. To-day all but a fractional part of all
legislation is enacted without puhlic cognizance and much of It
merely at the instigation o£ prtvate individuals who use the
constructive machinery of governraent £or purely personal pur-
poses. A good example of public indifference to legislation ia
aftorded by the general ignorance o£ even business men regard-
ing the attempt now making in Congress to enact a general
bankruptcy bili. The subject Is an old story in Washington, no
douht, but it is hard to see how it can lose interest to the point
of utter indifferency £or a natíon bo entireiy comraerciai as
ours, and whose daily transactiona are so intimately coneerned
with the giving and receiving of credit and, of course, with the
laws that eontrol the same. Everybody, we know, is not of one
mind as to the value oC a hankruptcy law. There are some who
believe the hest course is to withhoid all legal protectlon or
reraedy from the creditor, leaving him only the radical remedy
of trusting none but the trustworthy. Qthers would go further,
but not beyond estending to the creditor the ordinary support
o£ the courts. Others, again, point to the fact that the commer-
cial depredations of dishonestr arejgreater in the United States
than elsewhere, due in their judgment to our lack of a sound
bankruptey act to make the way of the dishonest debtor some-