Chapter X: Front Matter (10)

ELLIS, SIR HENRY (1777-1869), English antiquary, was born in London on the 29th of November 1777. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' school, and at St John's College, Oxford, of which he was elected a fellow. After having held for a few months a sub-librarianship in the Bodleian, he was in 1800 appointed to a similar post in the British Museum. In 1827 he became chief librarian, and held that post until 1856, when he resigned on account of advancing age. In 1832 William IV. made him a knight of Hanover, and in the following year he received an English knighthood. He died on the 15th of January 1869. Sir Henry Ellis's life was one of very considerable literary activity. His first work of importance was the preparation of a new edition of Brand's _Popular Antiquities_, which appeared in 1813. In 1816 he was selected by the commissioners of public records to write the introduction to Domesday Book, a task which he discharged with much learning, though several of his views have not stood the test of later criticism. His _Original Letters Illustrative of English History_ (first series, 1824; second series, 1827; third series, 1846) are compiled chiefly from manuscripts in the British Museum and the State Paper Office, and have been of considerable service to historical writers. To the Library of Entertaining Knowledge he contributed four volumes on the Elgin and Townley Marbles. Sir Henry was for many years a director and joint-secretary of the Society of Antiquaries.

ELLIS, ROBINSON (1834- ), English classical scholar, was born at Barming, near Maidstone, on the 5th of September 1834. He was educated at Elizabeth College, Guernsey, Rugby, and Balliol College, Oxford. In 1858 he became fellow of Trinity College, Oxford, and in 1870 professor of Latin at University College, London. In 1876 he returned to Oxford, where from 1883 to 1893 he held the university readership in Latin. In 1893 he succeeded Henry Nettleship as professor. His chief work has been on Catullus, whom he began to study in 1859. His first _Commentary on Catullus_ (1876) aroused great interest, and called forth a flood of criticism. In 1889 appeared a second and enlarged edition, which placed its author in the first rank of authorities on Catullus. Professor Ellis quotes largely from the early Italian commentators, maintaining that the land where the Renaissance originated had done more for scholarship than is commonly recognized. He has supplemented his critical work by a translation (1871, dedicated to Tennyson) of the poems in the metres of the originals. Another author to whom Professor Ellis has devoted many years' study is Manilius, the astrological poet. In 1891 he published _Noctes Manilianae_, a series of dissertations on the _Astronomica_, with emendations. He has also treated Avianus, Velleius Paterculus and the Christian poet Orientius, whom he edited for the Vienna _Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum_. He edited the _Ibis_ of Ovid, the _Aetna_ of the younger Lucilius, and contributed to the _Anecdota Oxoniensia_ various unedited Bodleian and other manuscripts. In 1907 he published _Appendix Vergiliana_ (an edition of the minor poems); in 1908 _The Annalist Licinianus_.

ELLIS, WILLIAM (1794-1872), English Nonconformist missionary, was born in London on the 29th of August 1794. His boyhood and youth were spent at Wisbeach, where he worked as a market-gardener. In 1814 he offered himself to the London Missionary Society, and was accepted. During a year's training he acquired some knowledge of theology and of various practical arts, such as printing and bookbinding. He sailed for the South Sea Islands in January 1816, and remained in Polynesia, occupying various stations in succession, until 1824, when he was compelled to return home on account of the state of his wife's health. Though the period of his residence in the islands was thus comparatively short, his labours were very fruitful, contributing perhaps as much as those of any other missionary to bring about the extraordinary improvement in the religious, moral and social condition of the Pacific Archipelago that took place during the 19th century. Besides promoting the spiritual object of his mission, he introduced many other aids to the improvement of the condition of the people. His gardening experience enabled him successfully to acclimatize many species of tropical fruits and plants, and he set up and worked the first printing press in the South Seas. Returning home by way of the United States, where he advocated his work, Ellis was for some years employed as a travelling agent of the London Missionary Society, and in 1832 was appointed foreign secretary to the society, an office which he held for seven years. In 1837 he married his second wife, Sarah Stickney, a writer and teacher of some note in her generation. In 1841 he went to live at Hoddesdon, Herts, and ministered to a small Congregational church there. On behalf of the London Missionary Society he paid three visits to Madagascar (1853-1857), inquiring into the prospects for resuming the work that had been suspended by Queen Ranavolona's hostility. A further visit was paid in 1863. Ellis wrote accounts of all his travels, and Southey's praise (in the _Quarterly Review_) of his _Polynesian Researches_ (2 vols., 1829) finds many echoes. He was a fearless, upright and tactful man, and a keen observer of nature. He died on the 25th of June 1872.

ELLISTON, ROBERT WILLIAM (1774-1831), English actor, was born in London on the 7th of April 1774, the son of a watchmaker. He was educated at St Paul's school, but ran away from home and made his first appearance on the stage as Tressel in _Richard III._ at Bath in 1791. Here he was later seen as Romeo, and in other leading parts, both comic and tragic, and he repeated his successes in London from 1796. He acted at Drury Lane from 1804 to 1809, and again from 1812; and from 1819 he was the lessee of the house, presenting Kean, Mme Vestris and Macready. Ill-health and misfortune culminated in his bankruptcy in 1826, when he made his last appearance at Drury Lane as Falstaff. But as lessee of the Surrey theatre he acted almost up to his death, which was hastened by intemperance. Leigh Hunt compared him favourably with Garrick; Byron thought him inimitable in high comedy; Macready praised his versatility. Elliston was the author of _The Venetian Outlaw_ (1805), and, with Francis Godolphin Waldron, of _No Prelude_ (1803), in both of which plays he appeared.

ELLORA, a village of India in the native state of Hyderabad, near the city of Daulatabad, famous for its rock temples, which are among the finest in India. They are first mentioned by Ma'sudi, the Arabic geographer of the 10th century, but merely as a celebrated place of pilgrimage. The caves differ from those of Ajanta in consequence of their being excavated in the sloping sides of a hill and not in a nearly perpendicular cliff. They extend along the face of the hill for a mile and a quarter, and are divided into three distinct series, the Buddhist, the Brahmanical and the Jain, and are arranged almost chronologically. The most splendid of the whole series is the Kailas, a perfect Dravidian temple, complete in all its parts, characterized by Fergusson as one of the most wonderful and interesting monuments of architectural art in India. It is not a mere interior chamber cut in the rock, but is a model of a complete temple such as might have been erected on the plain. In other words, the rock has been cut away externally as well as internally. First the great sunken court measuring 276 ft. by 154 ft. was hewn out of the solid trap-rock of the hillside, leaving the rock mass of the temple wholly detached in a cloistered court like a colossal boulder, save that a rock bridge once connected the upper storey of the temple with the upper row of galleried chambers surrounding three sides of the court. Colossal elephants and obelisks stand on either side of the open mandapam, or pavilion, containing the sacred bull; and beyond rises the monolithic Dravidian temple to Siva, 90 ft. in height, hollowed into vestibule, chamber and image-cells, all lavishly carved. Time and earthquakes have weathered and broken away bits of the great monument, and Moslem zealots strove to destroy the carved figures, but these defects are hardly noticed. The temple was built by Krishna I., Rashtrakuta, king of Malkhed in 760-783.

ELLORE, a town of British India, in the Kistna district of Madras, on the East Coast railway, 303 m. from Madras. Pop. (1901) 33,521. The two canal systems of the Godavari and the Kistna deltas meet here. There are manufactures of cotton and saltpetre, and an important Church of England high school. Ellore was formerly a military station, and the capital of the Northern Circars. At Pedda Vegi to the north of it are extensive ruins, which are believed to be remains of the Buddhist kingdom of Vengi. From these the Mahommedans, after their conquest of the district in 1470, obtained material for building a fort at Ellore.

ELLSWORTH, OLIVER (1745-1807), American statesman and jurist, was born at Windsor, Connecticut, on the 29th of April 1745. He studied at Yale and Princeton, graduating from the latter in 1766, studied theology for a year, then law, and began to practise at Hartford in 1771. He was state's attorney for Hartford county from 1777 to 1785, and achieved extraordinary success at the bar, amassing what was for his day a large fortune. From 1773 to 1775 he represented the town of Windsor in the general assembly of Connecticut, and in the latter year became a member of the important commission known as the "Pay Table," which supervised the colony's expenditures for military purposes during the War of Independence. In 1779 he again sat in the assembly, this time representing Hartford. From 1777 to 1783 he was a member of the Continental Congress, and in this body he served on three important committees, the marine committee, the board of treasury, and the committee of appeals, the predecessors respectively of the navy and treasury departments and the Supreme Court under the Federal Constitution. From 1780 to 1785 he was a member of the governor's council of Connecticut, which, with the lower house before 1784 and alone from 1784 to 1807, constituted a supreme court of errors; and from 1785 to 1789 he was a judge of the state superior court. In 1787, with Roger Sherman and William Samuel Johnson (1727-1819), he was one of Connecticut's delegates to the constitutional convention at Philadelphia, in which his services were numerous and important. In particular, when disagreement seemed inevitable on the question of representation, he, with Roger Sherman, proposed what is known as the "Connecticut Compromise," by which the Federal legislature was made to consist of two houses, the upper having equal representation from each state, the lower being chosen on the basis of population. Ellsworth also made a determined stand against a national paper currency. Being compelled to leave the convention before its adjournment, he did not sign the instrument, but used his influence to secure its ratification by his native state. From 1789 to 1796 he was one of the first senators from Connecticut under the new Constitution. In the senate he was looked upon as President Washington's personal spokesman and as the leader of the Administration party. His most important service to his country was without a doubt in connexion with the establishment of the Federal judiciary. As chairman of the committee having the matter in charge, he drafted the bill by the enactment of which the system of Federal courts, almost as it is to-day, was established. He also took a leading part in the senate in securing the passage of laws for funding the national debt, assuming the state debts and establishing a United States bank. It was Ellsworth who suggested to Washington the sending of John Jay to England to negotiate a new treaty with Great Britain, and he probably did more than any other man to induce the senate, despite widespread and violent opposition, to ratify that treaty when negotiated. By President Washington's appointment he became chief justice of the Supreme Court of the United States in March 1796, and in 1799 President John Adams sent him, with William Vans Murray (1762-1803) and William R. Davie (1756-1820), to negotiate a new treaty with France. It was largely through the influence of Ellsworth, who took the principal part in the negotiations, that Napoleon consented to a convention, of the 30th of September 1800, which secured for citizens of the United States their ships captured by France but not yet condemned as prizes, provided for freedom of commerce between the two nations, stipulated that "free ships shall give a freedom to goods," and contained provisions favourable to neutral commerce. While he was abroad, failing health compelled him (1800) to resign the chief-justiceship, and after some months in England he returned to America in 1801. In 1803 he was again elected to the governor's council, and in 1807, on the reorganization of the Connecticut judiciary, was appointed chief justice of the new Supreme Court. He never took office, however, but died at his home in Windsor on the 27th of November 1807.

See W.G. Brown's _Oliver Ellsworth_ (New York, 1905), an excellent
biography. There is also an appreciative account of Ellsworth's life
and work in H.C. Lodge's _A Fighting Frigate, and Other Essays and
Addresses_ (New York, 1902), which contains in an appendix an
interesting letter by Senator George F. Hoar concerning Ellsworth's
work in the constitutional convention.

ELLSWORTH, a city, port of entry and the county seat of Hancock county, Maine, U.S.A., at the head of navigation on the Union river (and about 3-3/4 m. from its mouth), about 30 m. S.E. of Bangor. Pop. (1890) 4804; (1900) 4297 (189 foreign-born); (1910) 3549. It is served by the Maine Central railway. The fall of the river, about 85 ft. in 2 m., furnishes good water-power, and the city has various manufactures, including lumber, shoes, woollens, sails, carriages and foundry and machine shop products, besides a large lumber trade. Shipbuilding was formerly important. There is a large United States fish hatchery here. The city is the port of entry for the Frenchman's Bay customs district, but its foreign trade is unimportant. Ellsworth was first settled in 1763 and for some time was called New Bowdoin; but when it was incorporated as a town in 1800 the present name was adopted in honour of Oliver Ellsworth. A city charter was secured in 1869.

ELLWANGEN, a town of Germany in the kingdom of Wurttemberg, on the Jagst, 12 m. S.S.E. from Crailsheim on the railway to Goldshofe. Pop. 5000. It is romantically situated between two hills, one crowned by the castle of Hohen-Ellwangen, built in 1354 and now used as an agricultural college, and the other, the Schonenberg, by the pilgrimage church of Our Lady of Loreto, in the Jesuit style of architecture. The town possesses one Evangelical and five Roman Catholic churches, among the latter the Stiftskirche, the old abbey church, a Romanesque building dating from 1124, and the Gothic St Wolfgangskirche. The classical and modern schools (Gymnasium and Realschule) occupy the buildings of a suppressed Jesuit college. The industries include the making of parchment covers, of envelopes, of wooden hafts and handles for tools, &c., and tanneries. There are also a wool-market and a horse-market, the latter famous in Germany.

The Benedictine abbey of Ellwangen is said to have been founded in 764 by Herulf, bishop of Langres; there is, however, no record of it before 814. In 1460 the abbey was converted, with the consent of Pope Pius II., into a _Ritterstift_ (college or institution for noble pensioners) under a secular provost, who, in 1555, was raised to the dignity of a prince of the Empire. The provostship was secularized in 1803 and its territories were assigned to Wurttemberg. The town of Ellwangen, which grew up round the abbey and received the status of a town about the middle of the 14th century, was until 1803 the capital of the provostship.

See Seckler, _Beschreibung der gefursteten Probstei Ellwangen_
(Stuttgart, 1864); _Beschreibung des Oberamts Ellwangen_, published by
the statistical bureau (Landesamt) at Ellwangen (1888). For a list of
the abbots and provosts see Stokvis, _Manuel d'histoire_ (Leiden,
1890-1893), iii. p. 242.

ELLWOOD, THOMAS (1639-1714), English author, was born at Crowell, in Oxfordshire, in 1639. He is chiefly celebrated for his connexion with Milton, and the principal facts of his life are related in a very interesting autobiography, which contains much information as to his intercourse with the poet. While he was still young his father removed to London, where Thomas became acquainted with a Quaker family named Pennington, and was led to join the Society of Friends, a connexion which subjected him to much persecution. It was through the Penningtons that he was introduced in 1662 to Milton in the capacity of Latin reader. He spent nearly every afternoon in the poet's house in Jewin Street, until the intercourse was interrupted by an illness which compelled him to go to the country. After a period of imprisonment in the old Bridewell prison and in Newgate for Quakerism, Ellwood resumed his visits to Milton, who was now residing at a house his friend had taken for him at Chalfont St Giles. In 1665 Ellwood was again arrested and imprisoned in Aylesbury gaol. When he visited Milton after his release the poet gave him the manuscript of the _Paradise Lost_ to read. On returning the manuscript Ellwood said, "Thou hast said much here of Paradise lost; but what hast thou to say of Paradise found?" and when Milton long afterwards in London showed him _Paradise Regained_, it was with the remark, "This is owing to you, for you put it into my head at Chalfont." Ellwood was the friend of Fox and Penn, and was the author of several polemical works in defence of the Quaker position, of which _Forgery no Christianity_ (1674) and _The Foundation of Tithes Shaken_ (1678) deserve mention. His _Sacred Histories of the Old and New Testaments_ appeared in 1705 and 1709. He also published some volumes of poems, among them a _Davideis_ in five books. He died on the 1st of March 1714.

_The History of the Life of Thomas Ellwood: written by his own hand_
(1714) has been many times reprinted.

ELM, the popular name for the trees and shrubs constituting the genus _Ulmus_, of the natural order Ulmaceae. The genus contains fifteen or sixteen species widely distributed throughout the north temperate zone, with the exception of western North America, and extending southwards as far as Mexico in the New and the Sikkim Himalayas in the Old World.

The common elm, _U. campestris_, a doubtful native of England, is found throughout a great part of Europe, in North Africa and in Asia Minor, whence it ranges as far east as north Asia and Japan. It grows in woods and hedge-rows, especially in the southern portion of Britain, and on almost all soils, but thrives best on a rich loam, in open, low-lying, moderately moist situations, attaining a height of 60 to 100, and in some few cases as much as 130 or 150 ft. The branches are numerous and spreading, and often pendulous at the extremities; the bark is rugged; the leaves are alternate, ovate, rough, doubly serrate, and, as in other species of _Ulmus_, unequal at the base. The flowers are small, hermaphrodite, numerous, in purplish-brown tufts, and each with a fringed basal bract; the bell-shaped calyx is often four-toothed and surrounds four free stamens; the pistil bears two spreading hairy styles. They appear before the leaves in March and April. The seed-vessels are green, membranous, one-seeded and deeply cleft. Unlike the wych elm, the common elm rarely perfects its seed in England, where it is propagated by means of root suckers from old trees, or preferably by layers from stools. In the first ten years of its growth it ordinarily reaches a height of 25 to 30 ft. The wood, at first brownish white, becomes, with growth, of a brown colour having a greenish shade. It is close-grained, free from knots, without apparent medullary rays, and is hard and tough, but will not take a polish. All parts of the trunk, including the sapwood, are available in carpentry. By drying, the wood loses over 60% of its weight, and has then a specific gravity of 0.588. It has considerable transverse strength, does not crack when once seasoned, and is remarkably durable under water, or if kept quite dry; though it decays rapidly on exposure to the weather, which in ten to eighteen months causes the bark to fall off, and gives to the wood a yellowish colour--a sign of deterioration in quality. To prevent shrinking and warping it may be preserved in water or mud, but it is best worked up soon after felling. Analyses of the ash of the wood have given a percentage of 47.8% of lime, 21.9% of potash, and 13.7% of soda. In summer, elm trees often exude an alkaline gummy substance, which by the action of the air becomes the brown insoluble body termed _ulmin_. Elm wood is used for keels and bilge-planks, the blocks and dead-eyes of rigging, and ships' pumps, for coffins, wheels, furniture, carved and turned articles, and for general carpenters' work; and previous to the common employment of cast iron was much in request for waterpipes. The inner bark of the elm is made into bast mats and ropes. It contains mucilage, with a little tannic acid, and was formerly much employed for the preparation of an antiscorbutic decoction, now obsolete. The bark of _Ulmus fulva_, the slippery or red elm of the United States and Canada, serves the North American Indians for the same purpose, and also as a vulnerary. The leaves as well as the young shoots of elms have been found a suitable food for live stock. For ornamental purposes elm trees are frequently planted, and in avenues, as at the park of Stratfieldsaye, in Hampshire, are highly effective. They were first used in France for the adornment of public walks in the reign of Francis I. In Italy, as in ancient times, it is still customary to train the vine upon the elm--a practice to which frequent allusion has been made by the poets. The cork-barked elm, _U. campestris_, var. _suberosa_, is distinguished chiefly by the thick deeply fissured bark with which its branches are covered. There are numerous cultivated forms differing in size and shape of leaf, and manner of growth.

The Scotch or wych elm, _U. montana_, is indigenous to Britain and is the common elm of the northern portion of the island; it usually attains a height of about 50 ft., but among tall-growing trees may reach 120 ft. It has drooping branches and a smoother and thinner bark, larger and more tapering leaves, and a far less deeply notched seed-vessel than _U. campestris_. The wood, though more porous than in that species, is a tough and hard material when properly seasoned, and, being very flexible when steamed, is well adapted for boat-building. Branches of the wych elm were formerly manufactured into bows, and if forked were employed as divining-rods. The weeping elm, the most ornamental member of the genus, is a variety of this species. The Dutch or sand elm is a tree very similar to the wych elm, but produces inferior timber. The American or white elm, _U. americana_, is a hardy and very handsome species, of which the old tree on Boston (Mass.) Common was a representative. This tree is supposed to have been in existence before the settlement of Boston, and at the time of its destruction by the storm of the 15th of February 1876 measured 22 ft. in circumference.

ELMACIN (ELMAKIN or ELMACINUS), GEORGE (c. 1223-1274), author of a history of the Saracens, which extends from the time of Mahomet to the year 1118 of our era. He was a Christian of Egypt, where he was born; is known in the east as Ibn-Amid; and after holding an official position under the sultans of Egypt, died at Damascus. His history is principally occupied with the affairs of the Saracen empire, but it contains passages which relate to the Eastern Christians. It was published in Arabic and Latin at Leiden in 1625. The Latin version is a translation by Erpenius, under the title, _Historia saracenica_, and from this a French translation was made by Wattier as _L'Histoire mahometane_ (Paris, 1657).

ELMALI ("apple-town"), a small town of Asia Minor in the vilayet of Konia, the present administrative centre of the ancient Lycia, but not itself corresponding to any known ancient city. It lies about 25 m. inland, at the head of a long upland valley (5000 ft.) inhabited by direct descendants of the ancient Lycians, who have preserved a distinctive facial type, noticeable at once in the town population. There are about fifty Greek families, the rest of the population (4000) being Moslem. The district is agricultural and has no manufactures of importance.

ELMES, HARVEY LONSDALE (1813-1847), British architect, son of James Elmes (q.v.), was born at Chichester in 1813. After serving some time in his father's office, and under a surveyor at Bedford and an architect at Bath, he became partner with his father in 1835, and in the following year he was successful among 86 competitors for a design for St George's Hall, Liverpool. The foundation stone of this building was laid en the 28th of June 1838, but, Elmes being successful in a competition for the Assize Courts in the same city, it was finally decided to include the hall and courts in a single building. In accordance with this idea, Elmes prepared a fresh design, and the work of erection commenced in 1841. He superintended its progress till 1847, when from failing health he was compelled to delegate his duties to Charles Robert Cockerell, and leave for Jamaica, where he died of consumption on the 26th of November 1847.

ELMES, JAMES (1782-1862), British architect, civil engineer, and writer on the arts, was born in London on the 15th of October 1782. He was educated at Merchant Taylors' school, and, after studying building under his father, and architecture under George Gibson, became a student at the Royal Academy, where he gained the silver medal in 1804. He designed a large number of buildings in the metropolis, and was surveyor and civil engineer to the port of London, but is best known as a writer on the arts. In 1809 he became vice-president of the Royal Architectural Society, but this office, as well as that of surveyor of the port of London, he was compelled through partial loss of sight to resign in 1828. He died at Greenwich on the 2nd of April 1862. His publications were:--_Sir Christopher Wren and his Times_ (1823); _Lectures on Architecture_ (1823); _The Arts and Artists_ (1825); _General and Biographical Dictionary of the Fine Arts_ (1826); _Treatise on Architectural Jurisprudence_ (1827), and _Thomas Clarkson: a Monograph_ (1854).

ELMHAM, THOMAS (d. c. 1420), English chronicler, was probably born at North Elmham in Norfolk. He became a Benedictine monk at Canterbury, and then joining the Cluniacs, was prior of Lenton Abbey, near Nottingham; he was chaplain to Henry V., whom he accompanied to France in 1415, being present at Agincourt. Elmham wrote a history of the monastery of St Augustine at Canterbury, which has been edited by C. Hardwick for the Rolls Series (1858); and a _Liber metricus de Henrico V._, edited by C.A. Cole in the _Memorials of Henry V._ (1858). It is very probable that Elmham wrote the famous _Gesta Henrici Quinti_, which is the best authority for the life of Henry V. from his accession to 1416. This work, often referred to as the "chaplain's life," and thought by some to have been written by Jean de Bordin, has been published for the English Historical Society by B. Williams (1850). Elmham, however, did not write the _Vita et Gesta Henrici V._, which was attributed to him by T. Hearne and others.

See C.L. Kingsford, _Henry V._ (1901).

ELMINA, a town on the Gold Coast, British West Africa, in 5 deg. 4' N., 1 deg. 20' W. and about 8 m. W. of Cape Coast. Pop. about 4000. Facing the Atlantic on a rocky peninsula is Fort St George, considered the finest fort on the Guinea coast. It is built square with high walls, and has accommodation for 200 soldiers. On the land side were formerly two moats, cut in the rock on which the castle stands. The castle is the residence of the commissioner of the district and other officials. The houses in the native quarter are mostly built of stone, that material being plentiful in the vicinity.

Elmina is the earliest European settlement on the Gold Coast, and was visited by the Portuguese in 1481. Christopher Columbus is believed to have been one of the officers who took part in this voyage. The Portuguese at once began to build the castle now known as Fort St George, but it was not completed till eighty years afterwards. Another defensive work is Fort St Jago, built in 1666, which is behind the town and at some distance from the coast. (In the latter half of the 19th century it was converted into a prison.) Elmina was captured by the Dutch in 1637, and ceded to them by treaty in 1640. They made it the chief port for the produce of Ashanti. With the other Dutch possessions on the Guinea coast, it was transferred to Great Britain in April 1872. The king of Ashanti, claiming to be ground landlord, objected to its transfer, and the result was the Ashanti war of 1873-1874. For many years the greatest output of gold from this coast came from Elmina. The annual export is said to have been nearly L3,000,000 in the early years of the 18th century, but the figure is probably exaggerated. Since 1900 the bulk of the export trade in gold has been transferred to Sekondi (q.v.). Prempeh, the ex-king of Ashanti, was detained in the castle (1896) until his removal to the Seychelles. (See ASHANTI: _History_, and GOLD COAST: _History_.)

ELMIRA, a city and the county-seat of Chemung county, New York, U.S.A., 100 m. S.E. of Rochester, on the Chemung river, about 850 ft. above sea-level. Pop. (1890) 30,893; (1900) 35,672, of whom 5511 were foreign-born (1988 Irish and 1208 German); (1910 census) 37,176. It is served by the Erie, the Pennsylvania, the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western, the Lehigh Valley, and the Tioga Division railways, the last of which connects it with the Pennsylvania coalfields 48 m. away. The city is attractively situated on both sides of the river, and has a fine water-supply and park system, among the parks being Eldridge, Rorick's Glen, Riverside, Brand, Diven, Grove, Maple Avenue and Wisner; in the last-named is a statue of Thomas K. Beecher by J.S. Hartley. The city contains a Federal building, a state armoury, the Chemung county court house and other county buildings, the Elmira orphans' home, the Steele memorial library, home for the aged, the Arnot-Ogden memorial hospital, the Elmira free academy, and the Railway Commercial training school. Here, also, is Elmira College (Presbyterian) for women, founded in 1855. This institution, chartered in 1852 as Auburn Female University and then situated in Auburn, was rechartered in 1855 as the Elmira Female College; it was established largely through the influence and persistent efforts of the Rev. Samuel Robbins Brown (1810-1880) and his associates, notably Simeon Benjamin of Elmira, who gave generously to the newly founded college, and was the first distinctively collegiate institution for women in the United States, and the first, apparently, to grant degrees to women. The most widely known institution in the city is the Elmira reformatory, a state prison for first offenders between the ages of sixteen and thirty, on a system of general indeterminate sentences. Authorized by the state legislature in 1866 and opened in 1876 under the direction of Zebulon Reed Brockway (b. 1827), it was the first institution of the sort and has served as a model for many similar institutions both in the United States and in other countries (see JUVENILE OFFENDERS). Elmira is an important railway centre, with large repair shops, and has also extensive manufactories (value of production in 1900, $8,558,786, of which $6,596,603 was produced under the "factory system"; in 1905, under the "factory system," $6,984,095), including boot and shoe factories, a large factory for fire-extinguishing apparatus, iron and steel bridge works, steel rolling mills, large valve works, steel plate mills, knitting mills, furniture, glass and boiler factories, breweries and silk mills. Near the site of Elmira occurred on the 29th of August 1779 the battle of Newtown, in which General John Sullivan decisively defeated a force of Indians and Tories under Sir John Johnson and Joseph Brant. There were some settlers here at the close of the War of Independence, but no permanent settlement was made until 1788. The village was incorporated as Newtown in 1815, and was reincorporated as Elmira in 1828. A city charter was secured in 1864. In 1861 a state military camp was established here, and in 1864-1865 there was a prison camp here for Confederate soldiers.

ELMSHORN, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Schleswig-Holstein, on the Kruckau, 19 m. by rail N.W. from Altona. Pop. (1905) 13,640. Its industries include weaving, dyeing, brewing, iron-founding and the manufacture of leather goods, boots and shoes and machines. There is a considerable shipping trade.

ELMSLEY, PETER (1773-1825), English classical scholar. He was educated at Westminster and Christ Church, Oxford, and having inherited a fortune from his uncle, a well-known bookseller, devoted himself to the study of classical authors and manuscripts. In 1798 he was appointed to the chapelry of Little Horkesley in Essex, which he held till his death. He travelled extensively in France and Italy, and spent the winter of 1818 in examining the MSS. in the Laurentian library at Florence. In 1819 he was commissioned, with Sir Humphry Davy, to decipher the papyri found at Herculaneum, but the results proved insignificant. In 1823 he was appointed principal of St Alban's Hall, Oxford, and Camden professor of ancient history. He died in Oxford on the 8th of March 1825. Elmsley was a man of most extensive learning and European reputation, and was considered to be the best ecclesiastical scholar in England. But it is chiefly by his collation of the MSS. of the Greek tragedians and his critical labours on the restoration of their text that he will be remembered. He edited the _Acharnians_ of Aristophanes, and several of the plays and scholia of Sophocles and Euripides. He was the first to recognize the importance of the Laurentian MS. (see Sandys, _Hist. of Class. Schol._ iii. (1908).

ELNE, a town of south-western France in the department of Pyrenees-Orientales, 10 m. S.S.E. of Perpignan by rail. Pop. (1906) 3026. The hill on which it stands, once washed by the sea, which is now over 3 m. distant, commands a fine view over the plain of Roussillon. From the 6th century till 1602 the town was the seat of a bishopric, which was transferred to Perpignan. The cathedral of St Eulalie, a Romanesque building completed about the beginning of the 12th century, has a beautiful cloister in the same style, with interesting sculptures and three early Christian sarcophagi. Remains of the ancient ramparts flanked by towers are still to be seen. Silk-worm cultivation is carried on. Elne, the ancient _Illiberis_, was named _Helena_ by the emperor Constantine in memory of his mother. Hannibal encamped under its walls on his march to Rome in 218 B.C. The emperor Constans was assassinated there in A.D. 350. The town several times sustained siege and capture between its occupation by the Moors in the 8th century and its capitulation in 1641 to the troops of Louis XIII.

EL OBEID, chief town of the mudiria (province) of Kordofan, Anglo-Egyptian Sudan, and 230 m. S.W. by S. of Khartum in a direct line. Pop. (1905) about 10,000. It is situated about 2000 ft. above the sea, at the northern foot of Jebel Kordofan, in 13 deg. 11' N. and 30 deg. 14' E. It is an important trade centre, the chief articles of commerce being gum, ivory, cattle and ostrich feathers. A considerable part of the trade of Darfur with Egypt passes through El Obeid.

El Obeid, which appears to be a place of considerable antiquity and the ancient capital of the country, was garrisoned by the Egyptians on their conquest of Kordofan in 1821. In September 1882 the town was assaulted by the troops of the mahdi, who, being repulsed, laid siege to the place, which capitulated on the 17th of January 1883. During the Mahdia the city was destroyed and deserted, and when Kordofan passed, in 1899, into the possession of the Anglo-Egyptian authorities nothing was left of El Obeid but a part of the old government offices. A new town was laid out in squares, the mudiria repaired and barracks built. (See KORDOFAN, and SUDAN: _Anglo-Egyptian_.)

ELOI [ELIGIUS], SAINT (588-659), apostle of the Belgians and Frisians, was born at Cadillac, near Limoges, in 588. Having at an early age shown artistic talent he was placed by his parents with the master of the mint at Limoges, where he made rapid progress in goldsmith's work. He became coiner to Clotaire II., king of the Franks, and treasurer to his successor Dagobert. Both kings entrusted him with important works, among which were the composition of the bas-reliefs which ornament the tomb of St Germain, bishop of Paris, and the execution (for Clotaire) of two chairs of gold, adorned with jewels, which at that time were reckoned _chefs-d'oeuvre_. Though he was amassing great wealth, Eloi acquired a distaste for a worldly life, and resolved to become a priest. At first he retired to a monastery, but in 640 was raised to the bishopric of Noyon. He made frequent missionary excursions to the pagans of the Low Countries, and also founded a great many monasteries and churches. He died on the 1st of December 659. A mass of legend has gathered round the life of St Eloi, who as the patron saint of goldsmiths is still very popular.

His life was written by his friend and contemporary St Ouen
(Audoenus); French translations of the _Vita S. Eligii auctore
Audoeno_ were published by L. de Montigny (Paris, 1626), by C.
Barthelemy in _Etudes hist., litt. et art._ (_ib._ 1847), and by
Parenty, with notes (2nd ed., ib. 1870). For bibliography see
Potthast, _Bibliotheca hist. med. aevi_ (Berlin, 1896), s.v. "Vita S.
Eligii Noviomensis," and Ulysse Chevalier, _Rep. des sources hist.,
Bio-bibl._ (Paris, 1894), s. "Eloi."

ELONGATION, strictly "lengthening"; in astronomy, the apparent angular distance of a heavenly body from its centre of motion, as seen from the earth; designating especially the angular distance of the planet Mercury or Venus from the sun, or the apparent angle between a satellite and its primary. The greatest elongation of Venus is about 45 deg.; that of Mercury generally ranges between 18 deg. and 27 deg.

EL PASO, a city, port of entry, and the county-seat of El Paso county, Texas, U.S.A., on the E. bank of the Rio Grande, in the extreme W. part of the state, at an altitude of 3710 ft. Pop. (1880) 736; (1890) 10,338; (1900) 15,906, of whom 6309 were foreign-born and 466 were negroes; (1910 census) 39,279. Many of the inhabitants are of Mexican descent. El Paso is an important railway centre and is served by the following railways: the Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe, of which it is the S. terminus; the El Paso & South-Western, which connects with the Chicago, Rock Island & El Paso (of the Rock Island system); the Galveston, Harrisburg & San Antonio, of which it is the W. terminus; the Mexican Central, of which it is the N. terminus; the Texas & Pacific, of which it is the W. terminus; a branch of the Southern Pacific, of which it is the E. terminus; and the short Rio Grande, Sierra Madre & Pacific, of which it is the N. terminus. The city is regularly laid out on level bottom lands, stretching to the table-lands and slopes to the N.E. and N.W. of the city. Opposite, on the W. bank of the river, is the Mexican town of Ciudad Juarez (until 1885 known as Paso del Norte), with which El Paso is connected by bridges and by electric railway. The climate is mild, warm and dry, El Paso being well known as a health resort, particularly for sufferers from pulmonary complaints. Among the city's public buildings are a handsome Federal building, a county court house, a city hall, a Y.M.C.A. building, a public library, a sanatorium for consumptives, and the Hotel Dieu, a hospital maintained by Roman Catholics. El Paso is the seat of St Joseph's Academy and of the El Paso Military Institute. Three miles E. of the city limits is Fort Bliss, a U.S. military post, with a reservation of about 2 sq. m. El Paso's situation on the Mexican frontier gives it a large trade with Mexico; it is the port of entry of the Paso del Norte customs district, one of the larger Mexican border districts, and in 1908 its imports were valued at $2,677,784 and its exports at $5,661,901. Wheat, boots and shoes, mining machinery, cement, lime, lumber, beer, and denatured alcohol are among the varied exports; the principal imports are ore, sugar, cigars, oranges, drawn work and Mexican curios. El Paso has extensive manufactories, especially railway car shops, which in 1905 employed 34.5% of the factory wage-earners. Just outside the city limits are important lead smelting works, to which are brought ores for treatment from western Texas, northern Mexico, New Mexico and Arizona. Among the city's manufactures are cement, denatured alcohol, ether, varnish, clothing and canned goods. The value of the city's total factory product in 1905 was $2,377,813, 96% greater than that in 1900. El Paso lies in a fertile agricultural valley, and in 1908 the erection of an immense dam was begun near Engle, New Mexico (100 m. above El Paso), by the U.S. government, to store the flood waters of the Rio Grande for irrigating this area. Before the Mexican War, following which the first United States settlement was made, the site of El Paso was known as Ponce de Leon Ranch, the land being owned by the Ponce de Leon family. El Paso was first chartered as a city in 1873, and in 1907 adopted the commission form of government.

ELPHINSTONE, MOUNTSTUART (1779-1859), Indian statesman and historian, fourth son of the 11th Baron Elphinstone in the peerage of Scotland, was born in 1779. Having received an appointment in the civil service of the East India Company, of which one of his uncles was a director, he reached Calcutta in the beginning of 1796. After filling several subordinate posts, he was appointed in 1801 assistant to the British resident at Poona, at the court of the peshwa, the most powerful of the Mahratta princes. Here he obtained his first opportunity of distinction, being attached in the capacity of diplomatist to the mission of Sir Arthur Wellesley to the Mahrattas. When, on the failure of negotiations, war broke out, Elphinstone, though a civilian, acted as virtual aide-de-camp to General Wellesley. He was present at the battle of Assaye, and displayed such courage and knowledge of tactics throughout the whole campaign that Wellesley told him he had mistaken his profession, and that he ought to have been a soldier. In 1804, when the war closed, he was appointed British resident at Nagpur. Here, the times being uneventful and his duties light, he occupied much of his leisure in reading classical and general literature, and acquired those studious habits which clung to him throughout life. In 1808 he was appointed the first British envoy to the court of Kabul, with the object of securing a friendly alliance with the Afghans; but this proved of little value, because Shah Shuja was driven from the throne by his brother before it could be ratified. The most valuable permanent result of the embassy was the literary fruit it bore several years afterwards in Elphinstone's great work on Kabul. After spending about a year in Calcutta arranging the report of his mission, Elphinstone was appointed in 1811 to the important and difficult post of resident at Poona. The difficulty arose from the general complication of Mahratta politics, and especially from the weak and treacherous character of the peshwa, which Elphinstone rightly read from the first. While the mask of friendship was kept up Elphinstone carried out the only suitable policy, that of vigilant quiescence, with admirable tact and patience; when in 1817 the mask was thrown aside and the peshwa ventured to declare war, the English resident proved for the second time the truth of Wellesley's assertion that he was born a soldier. Though his own account of his share in the campaign is characteristically modest, one can gather from it that the success of the British troops was chiefly owing to his assuming the command at an important crisis during the battle of Kirkee.

The peshwa being driven from his throne, his territories were annexed to the British dominions, and Elphinstone was nominated commissioner to administer them. He discharged the responsible task with rare judgment and ability. In 1819 he was appointed lieutenant-governor of Bombay and held this post till 1827, his principal achievement being the compilation of the "Elphinstone code." He may fairly be regarded as the founder of the system of state education in India, and he probably did more than any other Indian administrator to further every likely scheme for the promotion of native education. His connexion with the Bombay presidency was appropriately commemorated in the endowment of the Elphinstone College by the native communities, and in the erection of a marble statue by the European inhabitants.

Returning to England in 1829, after an interval of two years' travel, Elphinstone retained in his retirement and enfeebled health an important influence on public affairs. He twice refused the offer of the governor-generalship of India. Long before his return he had made his reputation as an author by his _Account of the Kingdom of Cabul and its Dependencies in Persia and India_ (1815). Soon after his arrival in England he commenced the preparation of a work of wider scope, a history of India, which was published in 1841. It embraces the Hindu and Mahommedan periods, and is still a work of high authority. He died on the 20th of November 1859.

See J.S. Cotton, _Mountstuart Elphinstone_ ("Rulers of India" series),
(1892); T.E. Colebrooke, _Life of Mountstuart Elphinstone_ (1884); and
G.W. Forrest, _Official Writings of Mountstuart Elphinstone_ (1884).

ELPHINSTONE, WILLIAM (1431-1514), Scottish statesman and prelate, founder of the university of Aberdeen, was born in Glasgow, and educated at the university of his native city, taking the degree of M.A. in 1452. After practising for a short time as a lawyer in the church courts, he was ordained priest, becoming rector of St Michael's church, Trongate, Glasgow, in 1465. Four years later he went to continue his studies at the university of Paris, where he became reader in canon law, and then, proceeding to Orleans, became lecturer in the university there. Before 1474 he had returned to Scotland, and was made rector of the university, and official of the see of Glasgow. Further promotion followed, but soon more important duties were entrusted to Elphinstone, who was made bishop of Ross in 1481. He was a member of the Scots parliament, and was sent by King James III. on diplomatic errands to Louis XI. of France, and to Edward IV. of England; in 1483 he was appointed bishop of Aberdeen, although his consecration was delayed for four years; and he was sent on missions to England, both before and after the death of Richard III. in 1485. Although he attended the meetings of parliament with great regularity he did not neglect his episcopal duties, and the fabric of the cathedral of Aberdeen owes much to his care. Early in 1488 the bishop was made lord high chancellor, but on the king's death in the following June he vacated this office, and retired to Aberdeen. As a diplomatist of repute, however, his services were quickly required by the new king, James IV., in whose interests he visited the kings of England and France, and the German king, Maximilian I. Having been made keeper of the privy seal in 1492, and having arranged a dispute between the Scotch and the Dutch, the bishop's concluding years were mainly spent in the foundation of the university of Aberdeen. The papal bull for this purpose was obtained in 1494, and the royal charter which made old Aberdeen the seat of a university is dated 1498. A small endowment was provided by the king, and the university, modelled on that of Paris and intended principally to be a school of law, soon became the most famous and popular of the Scots seats of learning, a result which was largely due to the wide experience and ripe wisdom of Elphinstone and of his friend, Hector Boece, the first rector. The building of the college of the Holy Virgin in Nativity, now King's College, was completed in 1506, and the bishop also rebuilt the choir of his cathedral, and built a bridge over the Dee. Continuing to participate in public affairs he opposed the policy of hostility towards England which led to the disaster at Flodden in September 1513, and died in Edinburgh on the 25th of October 1514. Elphinstone was partly responsible for the introduction of printing into Scotland, and for the production of the _Breviarium Aberdonense_. He may have written some of the lives in this collection, and gathered together materials concerning the history of Scotland; but he did not, as some have thought, continue the _Scotichronicon_, nor did he write the _Lives of Scottish Saints_.

See Hector Boece, _Murthlacensium et Aberdonensium episcoporum vitae_,
edited and translated by J. Moir (Aberdeen, 1894); _Fasti
Aberdonenses_, edited by C. Innes (Aberdeen, 1854); and A. Gardyne,
_Theatre of Scottish Worthies and Lyf of W. Elphinston_, edited by D.
Laing (Aberdeen, 1878).

EL RENO, a city and the county-seat of Canadian county, Oklahoma, U.S.A., on the N. fork of the Canadian river, about 26 m. W. of Oklahoma City. Pop. (1890) 285; (1900) 3383; (1907) 5370 (401 were of negro descent and 7 were Indians); (1910) 7872. It is served by the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific, the Choctaw, Oklahoma & Gulf (owned by the Chicago, Rock Island & Pacific), and the St Louis, El Reno & Western railways, the last extending from El Reno to Guthrie. El Reno lies on the rolling prairie lands, about 1360 ft. above the sea, in an Indian corn, wheat, oats and cotton-producing and dairying region, and has a large grain elevator, a cotton compress, and various manufacturing establishments, among the products being flour, canned goods and crockery. El Reno has a Carnegie library, and within the city's limits is Bellamy's Lake (180 acres), a favourite resort. Near the city is a Government boarding school for the Indians of the Cheyenne and the Arapahoe Reservation. Fort Reno, a U.S. military post, was established near El Reno in 1876, and in 1908 became a supply depot of the quartermaster's department under the name of "Fort Reno Remount Depot." The first settlement here, apart from the fort, was made in the autumn of 1889; in 1892 El Reno received a city charter.

ELSFLETH, a maritime town of Germany, in the grand-duchy of Oldenburg, in a fertile district at the confluence of the Hunte with the Weser, on the railway Hude-Nordenham. Pop. 2000. It has an Evangelical church, a school of navigation, a harbour and docks. It has considerable trade in corn and timber and is one of the centres of the North Sea herring fishery.