Columbia University Libraries Digital Collections: The Real Estate Record

Real estate record and builders' guide: v. 64, no. 1640: August 19, 1899

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August 19. 1899. lîECOTîD AJVD GUIDE. 273 li^^i^J V^ tStABUSHm^l Biaoftsi jublHEUBS or Cei^Q)^ iKioiFsio PRICE PER YEAR IN ADVANCE SIX DOLLARS. Published every lalui-day. Tblkfbone, Coktlandt,1370. Commun ica tiona should be addressea to C. W. SWEET, 14-16 Vesey Btreet. J. 1. LTND8BT, Business Manager. " Entered at the Post-0£iee at New York, ff. T., asseewid-classna'ier." Vol. LXlV. AUGUST 19, 1899. No. 1,640. DEALINGS on the Stock Bxchange are increasing in bulk as lE there would he a pretty heavy demand for stocks as soon as the vacations are over. It is not to be presumed that we will then see another movement like that that ciosed last spring, hut a great deal of money must now be amaking ln all lines of busi¬ ness, and the question avises, what wiil he done with it? Some, of course, will go into further extensions and developments of industrial enterprise, hut some, large in hulk, will seek invest¬ ment in WaU street. This raises another question; What direc¬ tion will this take? The supply of Government and municipal bonds îs small and largeiy flows to institutions and trust funds. The income return on such bonds is too small to attract any but a small percentage of outside investors who are likely to seek profitable uses for their money more among quoted securities than «Isewhere. Wlth this pressure under quotations it is impossible to conceive of a hear market in the near future, the movement must be upward. That some securities are selling for more than they are worth on conservative estimâtes counts for nothing at the moment, later its effects will tell sharpiy. While money con¬ stantly flows into the market and confidence in the business sit¬ uation is maintained prices must advance. Moreover, the mar¬ ket is constantly reminded that the time is one of commercial and industrial activity and expansion. New comblnations are con¬ stantly being made under the promise of profit, or the necessities of enterprise. New agencies for the transaction of business are suddenly demanded, in support of which may be cited the num¬ ber of the new trust companies that hâve been estabiished right hère in New York in the past year, and the évident prospect of their profitable opération. Nothing like this development in the financial world was ever seen before; it is truly phénoménal, and it is in overlooking the phenomenaîity of the occurrences of the times as they relate to commercial and financial development, that those who bave been trying for the past month or two to work up a bear market bave made their mistakes. To-day must not be judged by yesterday, but by the conditions it individually présents almost wholly. EUROPEAN politics are always in a more or less mixed state to the sight of the outside observer, Just now the muddle ■seems to arise out of the imminent collapse of the Franco-Russian and the Triple alliances. The situation seems to hâve led the Ger¬ man Emperor to believe that he must seciu-e a rapprochement with France or a revival of the Dreikaiser-bund, preferahly the latter. A. Franco-German union would throw Russia and Aus¬ tria, and probably Italy together. This arrangement would se¬ cure peace as effectively as the old alliances did. An under¬ standing among the three Emperors, however, would leave France in a bad position and dépendent on what support she could obtain from Britain and Italy in the event of attack, either diplo¬ matie or military, This ie an additional reason why she should at this moment rise superior to injustice and internai discord. Except that the conviction and punishment of Dreyfus in the first place throws doubt upon the ability of the French to see straight in any case, there is reason to believe that the resuit of the pro¬ ceedings at Rennes will be a triuraph for justice. The foreign- correspondents there appear to hâve caught the French sensi- tiveness to passing impressions so that their alternating fear and confidence should hâve little weight and cause no anxiety. A week bas not changed the business situation in Europe. Money ia a little easier, and there is no immédiate prospect of an advance in rates. Figures for the German export trade show for the first -half year an increase of $30,000,000, considerably less than the ■increase for France, and not half as much as that for Great Britain. An improvement in the trade to this country is noted, "experts hither increasing $10,000,000. The imports of pig and scrap iron were very large. .Shares of the Creditanstalt, by which the feeling of the Vienna Bourse is gauged, continue steadily to rise as do also the most représentative spéculative issues. Gov¬ ernments, however, as elsewhere fail to attract, the return they offer not being enough in a time of trade activity and confidence. In Roumaui-a a desperate state of affairs has set in in conséquence of the droughts of spring. Nearly the entire harvest is Jost, and the Government is taking measures to provide for the cattle which the peasants are about to sell and for next year's sowing. The payment of rents and taxes was prolongea, and maize an4 hay were distributed. "The gênerai position and outlook" at Buenos Ayres, says a capable but always pessimistic critic, "in a commercial and financial sensé, is becoming more unsatisfactory and threatening every day, and the inévitable crisis that waa bound to spring from the sudden reaction from the eurrency in- fiation of the past few years is now looming up fast, and will, tt is to be feared, prove quite as disastrous, if not more so, than the long séries of troubles the country has gone through since 1890," The Australian news is generally good. Gold production of the first five months of the year increased by 289,002 ozs. and a total production of 4,000.000 ozs. is antieipated for the year. Confidence has been revived in the position of the banks whose shares are rapidly advancing in the market. It is thought that the first fédéral parliament will come into existence about eighteen months hence, Under the constitution it will hâve two years to frame a uniform customs tariff, Probably, therefore, three yeara will elapse before the great tariff change will take place. QUITE a discussion has been raised by the little ceremony that took place outside the Tower Building last week, and the correctness of the statement borne on the face of the tablet then unveiied has been challenged by Chicago. At the same time a claim has been set up for that city as the birthpiace of skeleton construction, which, fortunately for the claims of New York, is contradicted by the facts brought forward in its support. The So¬ ciety of Architectural Iron Manufacturers had fully examined the whole matter and had indubitable évidence that the Tower Building was the first complète spécimen of "skeleton construc¬ tion," before the idea of affixing a tablet on its portais to eom- memorate the epoch in building it timed had been thought of, This construction had a long line of progenitors behind it with which it had racial resembiances, but it brought the line to per¬ fection by individual characteristics that made it, to use an ex¬ pression of the horticulturists, a "sort," and deserving of a dis- tinctive cognomen. It grew out of "cage construction," but as a higher form of cultivation, The différence between the two is quite marked, and, although stated before, their définitions may be given again in order to make the matter quite clear: Skeleton construction is a framework of iron or steel columns and girders wbich carry the weight of the outer enclosing brick walls to¬ gether with the floors down to the foundations at initial points. Cage construction is a framework of iron or steel columns and girders also, but one carrying the fioors only and leaving the outer walls dépendent on themselves, The Home Life Building in Chicago which is put forward to claim priority for that city in this method of building is of the latter form of construction and therefore cannot impugn the claim made on behalf of New York by the Society of Architectural Iron Manufacturers in the permanent form of a bronze tablet securely fixed to the exhibit they offer in évidence, The erudite in such matters tell us that the principle involved in skeleton construction is very ancient, the Coliseum being a development of it in masonry; that it ap¬ pears in parts of several New York buildings that antedate both the Home Life Building of Chicago and the Tower Building it¬ self, but that the latter was the first in which it was employed throughout. This is what the Society of Architectural Iron Manu¬ facturers of this city and the architect of the building assert. One of our most respected contemporaries, momentarily but humanly weak, however, supports the Chicago contention, and fears that as many cities will claim the honor of being the birthpiace of the perfected steel construction as do that of being the birthpiace of Homer, and that contention and confusion will therefore arise. We bave no such anxiety. The trouble with the Homer dispute arises from the neglect of vital statistics among the early Greeks. but there is no such trouble in this case, the certificate of the birth of "skeleton construction " is in New York, safely deposited in the archives of the Department of Buildings of this city, in the form of the plans of the Tower Building. SUPPORT to the belief, expressed a week ago in this column, that a war between Britain and the Transvaal would mean the end of the independence of the republic is found in the text of a speech in Parliament, delivered by Lord Salisbury, at the close of the session. He said, in référence to the agreements with