ELLIOT ELM. 



847 



duties of the office. The bookseller Hone, having 

 published tliree well known parodies on the Chris- 

 tian religion, was tried on the indictment for the 

 first before Abbot, tor the two others before Ellen- 

 borough. Both judges, in their charges to the 

 jury, declared the publications to be libels ; yet the 

 jury returned a verdict of not guilty, and the specta- 

 tors manifested their satisfaction by applause. This 

 event had an unfavourable effect on lord Ellenbo- 

 rough's already feeble health, and, after a long sick- 

 ness, he resigned his office in 1818. He died De- 

 cember 13th of the same year, at the age of seventy 

 years. Lord Ellenborough enjoys a high reputation 

 for legal ability. 



ELLIOT. See Eliott. 



ELLIPSIS; 1. in grammar and rhetoric; the 

 omission of one or more words, which may be easily 

 supplied by the imagination. It is used to express 

 passion, or for the sake of conciseness. The latter 

 is particularly the case in familiar phrases. 2. In 

 mathematics; one of the conic sections. (See Cone.) 

 Kepler discovered that the planets describe such a 

 curve in revolving about the sun. It presents to 

 the eye at once variety and regularity, and is, there- 

 fore, preferred by painters to the circle for the out- 

 line of their pictures. Two points in the longest 

 diameter have this peculiarity : the sum of two 

 straight lines drawn from them to any point in the 

 circumference is always the same, to whatever point 

 they are drawn. On this is founded the usual method 

 ot describing an ellipse. At a given distance on the 

 plane on which the ellipse is to be described, fix two 

 pins. A and B, and pass a string, A,B,C, round them. 

 Keep the string stretched 

 by a pencil C, and move 

 the pencil along, keeping 

 F the string at the same ten- 

 sion, then the ellipse E 

 C G L F H will be de- 

 scribed. A and B are 

 the/ocj, D the centre, E F the major axis, and G H 

 the minor axis, D A or D B is the eccentricity of 

 the ellipse. If from any point L in the curve, a line 

 L K be drawn parallel to a tangent drawn to the end 

 cf the axis E F, then will L K be ordinate to the 

 axis E F, corresponding to the point L ; and the por- 

 tions E K, K F, into which L K divides the major 

 axis, are said to be the abscissa to the ordinate L K. 

 ELLIPTICITY OF THE TERRESTRIAL 

 SPHEROID. See Degree, Measurement of. 



ELLIS, GEORGE, an ingenious writer, was a native 

 of London, and educated at Westminster school and 

 Trinity college, Cambridge. He obtained an office 

 under government during the administration of Mr 

 Pitt, and was secretary to lord Malmesbury, in his 

 embassy to Lisle, in 1797. He was one of the junta 

 of wits concerned in the well known political satire, 

 The Rolliad, and wrote a preface, notes, and appen- 

 dix to Way's translation from the French of Le 

 Grand's Fabliaux ; besides which, he published Spe- 

 cimens of the early English Poets, with an Historical 

 Sketch of the Rise and Progress of English Poetry 

 and Languag3, 3 volumes 8vo; and Specimens of 

 early English Metrical Romances, 3 vols. 8vo. The 

 two latter works have passed through several edi- 

 tions ; and they display much ingenuity, and a gene- 

 ral, though not a profound acquaintance with English 

 literature. Mr Ellis, who was a fellow of the royal 

 society, and the society of antiquaries, died in 1815, 

 aged seventy. 



ELLIS, JOHN, a celebrated naturalist, and one of 

 the first who suggested the idea that the South Sea 

 Islands were constructed and raised from the bottom 

 of the ocean by means of zoophytes, or the polypi, 

 inhabiting different species of coral, was a native of 



London, and died in 1776, aged about sixty-five. Ve 

 was for some time agent for the colony of West Flo- 

 rida and the island of Dominica. Among his works 

 is a posthumous one, entitled The Natural History of 

 many curious and enormous Zoophytes, London, 

 1786. He was author of an interesting essay on Bri- 

 tish and Irish corallines, and also of many valuable 

 papers in the Philosophical Transactions. 



ELLORA. See Elora. 



ELLWOOD, THOMAS, an early writer among the 

 Quakers, was born in 1639, at Crowell, nearThame, 

 in Oxfordshire, where he received such an education 

 as the humble circumstances of his parents would 

 afford. In his 21st year, he was induced to join the 

 society of Friends, by the preaching of one Edward 

 Burroughs, and he soon after published his first 

 piece, entitled An Alarm to the Priests, or a 

 Message from Heaven to warn them. He subse- 

 quently became reader to Milton, with whom he 

 improved himself in the learned languages, but was 

 soon obliged to quit London on account of his health. 

 In the year 1665, he procured a lodging for Milton 

 at Chalfont, Bucks, and was the occasion of his 

 writing Paradise Regained, by the following obser- 

 vation made on the return of the Paradise Lost, 

 which the poet had lent him to read in manuscript : 

 " Thou hast said much of paradise lost, but what 

 hast thou to say of paradise found '" In 1705, he 

 published the first part of Sacred History, or the 

 Historical Parts of the Old Testament, and, in 1709, 

 Sacred History, &c:, of the New Testament ; which 

 production was well received, and is still held in 

 some estimation. His other works are numerous ; 

 among them, Davideis, the Life of David, King of 

 Israel, a poem, which is more distinguished for piety 

 than poetry. He died in 1713, aged seventy-four. 

 His life, written by himself, affords many interesting 

 particulars of the history of his sect. 



ELM. The species of elm (ulmus) are trees or 

 shrubs, with alternate rough and simple "leaves, and 

 fascicles of small, inconspicuous flowers, which appear 

 before the foliage. About twenty species are known, 

 all inhabiting the temperate parts of the northern 

 hemisphere. 



The American or white elm is found from the forty- 

 ninth to the thirtieth parallel of latitude, is abundant 

 in the Western States, and extends beyond the Missis- 

 sippi, but attains its loftiest stature between lat. 42 

 and 46; here it reaches the height of 100 feet, with 

 a trunk four or five feet in diameter, rising sometimes 

 sixty or seventy feet, when it separates into a few 

 primary limbs, which are at first approximate, or 

 cross each other, but gradually diverge, diffusing on 

 all sides long, arched, pendulous branches, which 

 float in the air. It has been pronounced by Michaux 

 " the most magnificent vegetable of the temperate 

 zone." Its wood is not much esteemed. 



The red or slippery elm is found over a great 

 extent of country in Canada, Missouri, and as far 

 south as latitude 31 ; it attains the height of fifty or 

 sixty feet, with a trunk fifteen or twenty inches in 

 diameter; the wood is stronger and of a better 

 quality than that of the white elm, is employed in 

 constructing houses, and is good tor blocks. The 

 leaves and bark yield an abundant mucilage, to which 

 it owes its name, and which is a valuable remedy iii 

 coughs, and especially in dysentery and other bowel 

 complaints. 



The wahoo inhabits from lat. 37 to Florida, 

 Louisiana, and Arkansas, and is a small tree, some- 

 times thirty feet high, remarkable from the branches 

 being furnished, on two opposite sides, with wings of 

 cork, two or three lines wide ; the wood is tine. 

 grained, compact and heavy, and fias been used for 

 the naves of coach wheels. The wood of the U. 



