ELEVATOR. 794 ELGIN. tached to the piston-rod of the liydraulic cylin- der. To raise the car the pressure is turned into the cylinder and forces out the piston-rod, thus pilling the traveling sheaves away from the fixed sheaves. The hydraulic cylinder is often placed in a vertical position, and the travel inj; sheaves move up and down in the same shaft as the car. The operation nuiy l)e illustrated hy that of an ordinary hoisting-tackle in which a heavy load is raised a short distance by hauling in a com- paratively long length of hoisting-rope with a pulling force much snialler than the weight of ihe load lifted. By a reverse of this operation a hea"y load moving a short distance will hoist a light load through a long distance. This is exactly the operation performed by the arrange- ment of fixed and traveling sheaves of a hydraulic elevator plant. The operation of the most recent type of electric elevator is nuich similar to that just described for hydraulic elevators. As ap- plied to the elevators of the thirty-story Ivins Syndicate Huilding, in New York City, the elec- tric-elevator mechanism was as shown in the ac- companying diagram. Here it will be ol)served that a nut traveling on a screw operated hy an elec- tric motor gives the prop- er motion to the travel- ing sheaves. In many forms of electric elevator the motor operates a drum on which the hoist- ing-rope is wound and un- wound to hoist and lower the car. If in this con- struction we substitute for the electric motor a steam-engine to opcrat(^ the drum, we have the ordinary steam - elevator arrangement. The only other form of hydraulic elevator than those de- scribed has a vertical cylinder sunk in the ground with the piston- rod extending upward and the car su])])orted di- rectly on the piston-ro<l. This form of elevator is most suitable for short lifts, and is generally only used for freight ele- vators. As indicating the na- ture and size of sonic of the elevator installations in tall buildings, the fol- lowing figures are of in- terest : M o n a d n o c k Block, Chicago, 16 hy- draulic elevators, all of Ifi-stories travel; Saint Paul Building, New York, (i hydraulic ele- vators, two iiO-stories travel, two Ifl-stories travel, and two O-stories travel; Bowling (Jreen Buildings, New York, nine hydraulic elevators, 10-stories travel; Ivins Syndicate Building. New York, 15 electric elevators, five 2.'J-storics travel, five 26 stories travel, one freight elevator 26-stories travel, two tower elevators, and two sidewalk elevators. The Saint Paul Building plant is a good example of express elevator Monr Bcttom of Shaft. D1AGBA»I OF El.Kl.TRIC KLEVATOIl. .service. Two elevators in this building travel to the ninth floor, stopping at every floor; two travel to the sixteenth floor, passing every floor below the ninth without stops, or 'express,' and stopping at every floor from the ninth to the sixteentli, or 'local'; two travel to the twenty- fiflli floor, running express to the sixteenth floor and local above the sixteenth floor. Among ele- vators designed to carrv heavy loads may be mentioned those at the Weehawken. N. .J., ter- minus of the North Hudson County Railway, which have a lift of 14S feet, with cars holding 140 persons each. The elevator in the Wash- ington Monument, Washington, D. C, has a travel of 500 feet, and those of the Eifl'el Tower (q.v. ) have a travel nf 450 feet. For grain elevators, see that title, and for elevators or hoists for tunneling and mining work, see TuN- XELs and Mixixc. ELEVEN THOUSAND VIRGINS, The. See Uhsula, S.V1XT. EL-FASHER, cl-fa'sher. The capital of Dar- fur (q.v.), Egj'ptian .Sudan, Africa, situated in a well-watered valley east of the ilarrah Mountains (Map: Africa, G 3). Owing to its position at the point where .some of the most important caravan routes of northeastern Africa meet, the town is of considerable commercial importance. Its permanent population is esti- mated at 3000. EL-FAYUM. See Fayum. ELF OWL. The smallest of American owls, and perhaps the smallest of all owls — ilicro- palliis miitneyi. It is little more than six inches in length, and is redilish gray above and white below barred irregularly with rufous brown. It dwells in and about Arizona, feeds mainly upon beetles and grasshoppers, and keeps itself in thickets or willow copses, nesting almost invariably in deserted woodpeckers' holes made in the giant cactus. Consult: Fisher, Hauksand Owls of the United Htatcs (Washington. 1893) ; and The Auk, vol. iii. (New York, 188G). ELGAR, Edward William (1857—). An Eiisjiish musician, born at Broadheath, near Worcester. He was educated at Littleton House and studied the violin and the organ. In 188'2 he became conductor of the Worcester Instru- mental Society, and in 1885 also accepted the position of organist at Saint (k^orgc's. Both of these positions he gave ui) in 188!?, and two years later began to devote himself entirely to composi- tion. His works were universally popular in Eng- land and the United States, the most representa- tive being: The Black Knight (cantata, 1892) ; Ltim Christi (cantata. 1890) ; the oratorio The I.iqht of Life ( 1896) ; Choral tiidte. from the Ba- varian Highlands (1895); Te Deitm (1897): Dream of Oeroniius (cantata, 1900) ; a concert overture, Cockaigne (1901). EL-GHOR, el-gOr', Wadi. The northern jiart of the great depression known as Kl-.Vraba, which extends from the base of Mount Ilcnnon to the (iulf c^f .kabah. Tht! length of El-lihor from the Sc;i of (Jalilee to the Dead Sea is about 65 miles, and its width varies from 6 to 12 miles. ELGIN, el'gin. .A royal burgh, capital of El- ginshire, or Morayshire, Scotland, on the Lossie, about 5 miles from its seaport Lossiemouth, on the Moray Firth, and 71 miles northwest of Aberdeen "(Map: Scotland, E 2). Its once mag-
