June 8, 1901.





RECORD AND GUIDE.









PRICE  PER  YEAR  IN  ADVANCE   SIX   DOLLARS,

Published every Baiurday,

TELEPHONE,                                            CORTLANDT   I37O.

Gommunicatlone should he addressed to

C. W. SWEET. 14-16 Vesey Street.
J. T. LINDSEY, Business Manager.

"Entered at tM Poat-Office of New Torlc, If. T,, aa second-class matter."





Vol. LXVII.





JUNE 8, 1901.





No. 1734.





THB comparatively small public who are in the stock market
display a good deal of suspicion of the soundness of the
bull position. It is for this reason that the upward movement
that at the close of last week looked so promising, halted this
week. If the situation were rid of its extravagance and senti¬
mentality there would he disclosed good reasons why this should
"be the case. One is that, time, is bringing such commonplace re-
suits where the most romantic were promised; another that,
dividends foretold in the Street are not declared in the board¬
rooms, and in place of consolidations and mergers of gigantic
proportions we have ordinary traffic agreements and the most
natural changes in directories. However, the public have not
a.wakened to the full signiflcance of offlcial action and still
prefer journalistic dividends and guarantees, so that it is still
possible to induce them to help make a market upon which
professional operations can be realized and, apparently, im¬
possible to make them see that prices on the stock market have
long ago discounted all the benefits of the situation, with, of
course, the exceptions that always must be allowed from such
a sweeping generalization. What sustains the market in the
long run and makes advances easier to engineer than declines,
is the continued scarcity of stocks, due to causes too often men¬
tioned here to need repetition now. Our people are prosperous
and have no need to run to the stock market for assistance in
the form of cash, hence the securities bought for long pulls and
for investments remain in boxes. So long as this is the case,
and it will most probably endure for some time to come, big
breaks in prices should not be expected. Outside the areas of
speculation, the country is undoubtedly very prosperous, the
only complaints coming from the drygoods and some minor in¬
terests, testimony ou this head being almost unanimous. Those
people who cannot see that security prices always march
ahead of commercial and industrial results—and they are the
vast majority—regard this fact not as a realization but as a
pi-omise, and thereby justify themselves in making the additions
to quotations that outdo merit. The reduction of the Bank of
England's rate of discount is another sign of the contraction of
European business which would stimulate speculation were it
not for the doubts that continue to exist of satisfactory results
having been reached in either South Africa or China.





DOES the remark of Mr. Yerkes that the British do not un¬
derstand the value of a scrap heap disclose the difference
between American and British made goods? Our own manu¬
facturers will doubtless resent this beiug taken literally. It is
true that we as a nation have developed a fondness for the novel
and it follows that, if we must be continually having the new,
we perforce tend to the cheap. But where this is not carried to
excess, it may be qualified by good sense. There is such a thing
as making a thing too well and too enduring and there may be
economic reasoning in the scrap heap. But when we remember
that some British goods occasioned the invention of the word
"Brummagem" to signify shams, cheapness and instability, it
will take something more than what has occurred to make us
believe that the whole difference 'between our own and British
goods is found in the greater speed with which the former go
■to the junk dealer. One thing that stands in the way of develop¬
ment on the other side is the power and selfishness of the upper
classes; and another, corporate pride and stupidity. The upper
classes will not permit improvements that they imagine will
dnconvenienee themselves, or the corporations those that invade
their privileges. Where improvements are thus checked indus¬
try and inventiveness are stifled. Por instance, surface cars
have heen rigorously kept out of the limits of the old city of
London and the great arteries of travel that run through the
fashionable sections of the city. It is a fact, absurd as it may
seem, that the traveler on the southern lines of "trams" has to





walk or take a stuffy omnibus over the bridges that land him
within the walls. The northern and southern lines are sep¬
arated by miles and such is the power of custom that the poorer
public, who are dependent upon the street cars, put up with
such a state of things without a murmur. Persistent endeavors
have been made to induce Parliament to grant franchises on
streets where, for the benefit of the many, they are most needed,
but in vain. Even Mr. Yerkes will find the merely physical
part of his task comparatively easy to that of overcoming the
civic and class prejudices that he must encounter before he haa
completed it. When he is through he may talk of something
besides the scrap heap.





Recent Legislation and the Building Code.

XTTHILE the last legislature did not set itself to revise the
* ^      legal conditions surrounding construction in New York,
that  body  incidentally  did  make  some  important  changes  ia
them.    That   is   to   say, that   the   primary object of the new
tenement-house law, although it modifies one form of construc¬
tion in the most extensive way, was to improve the conditions
of the people living in the tenements.    If a plan had been pro¬
posed which in their judgment would have achieved this with¬
out  touching the  building,  it  would  doubtless  have  found  as ■
ready approval as did the one that was adopted.    In the same
way the provisions of the Charter that abolish the Department
of Buildings and substitute bureaus in the offices of the several
borough presidents, were accepted more as improvements in the
machinery of municipal government than as a beneflt conferred
or an obligation placed upon the industry most affected thereby.
But, whatever the motive underlying these changes they are so
important and in so many cases create conflict with the huilding
code established two years ago, that a revision of that document
has become necessary to avoid confusion in the future.    A new
cede cannot undo anything done by the legislature, but it can
conform itself to the acts of the latter, so that those who are not
acquainted with the legal precedences involved may not he led
astray by its language, which they are very likely to be if it is
not revised before the new Charter takes effect on Jan, 1st, 1902,
While the work of producing conformity betweea the code and
the new legislation is being done, it would be well if the former
was  read  at  the same  time for  the purpose of  changing  its
phraseology, to give effect to the original intent of the framers,
which its language has not always succeeded in doing, as well
as to remove some ambiguities that are now creating trouble
■between official interpreters and its dependents.     An instance
of the necessity of the first is found in the requirements for
height and numher of stories of a mercantile building.     Section
105 is so framed that such a building cannot be erected more
than 150 feet in height, or more than 12 stories, unless it com¬
plies with conditions for flreproofing that ought only be required
where the a^bsolute maximum of precaution against loss of life
by  fire  should  be  insisted  upon.      Now the  intention  of  the
framers of the code was that the exception from these require¬
ments should 'be a 12-story iDuilding; in practice, however, it is
found that a 12-story building cannot ibe obtained within a
height of 150 feet on a lot of the width usually used for such
structures now, and give the lower floors fair proportions; that
is, a height proportioned to width.     This has compelled the
erection of 11-story buildings where the framers of the code in¬
tended that i2-story buildings should be allowed.    For one in¬
stance of  confiict  in  original  intention  and   final   interpreta¬
tion, we may take the area of lot that may be covered by a
dwelling.    The code for the flrst time placed a limit on this area,
fixing it at 90 per cent,, but saying nothing aibout where the va¬
cancy should occur. The department has ruled that this shall be
at the rear of the house, not an unreasonable ruling, because,
at first sight it might easily appear that the intention of this
clause was to keep an open air space through the blocks.     But
the framers of the Charter never expected this interpretation to
be put upon their words.    In not specifying where the opening
was to occur, they followed the practice, justified by experience,
of previous framers of building laws and ordinances, of leaving
the problem of the treatment of the lot to the architect, so that
he might occupy the 90 per cent, where, in his judgment, it was
most advantageous.

Another matter that requires attention is that of appeal. The
Charter of 1897 created a Board of Buildings with appellate
powers, and retained the Board of Examiners with its powers
undiminished, except inferentially as they were reduced by
those conferred upon the Board of Buildinga. The result has
been that the inference has been exercised in favor of the latter
until the Board of Examiners has come to have practically noth¬
ing to do. The new Charter confers on the borough presidents
and superintendents of buildings the powers of the present Com-