Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 8.djvu/567

Rh E S K E S P 547 whole Eskimo race does not, it is believed, exceed 40,000. Hut we have really no data, except at spots where they have come in contact with Europeans. Bibliography. Fragmentary notices of the Eskimo may be found in numerous works. &quot;We need only take cognizance here of moderu vriters who have actually lived among the Eskimo. These are : Kink, Eskimoiskb Ecentyr oy &amp;lt;/(! 866) ; Supplement to the same work (1871) ; Tales and Traditions of the Eskimo (1875) ; Danish Greenland: its People and its Products (1877); Gronlaiul, yeogra- i&amp;gt; iiskog Slatistiskbcskrcvct, 2 vcls. (1857) ; Om EskimoerncsIIerkomst Aarbog for Nord. Oldk. og Hist. 1871, pp. 269-302); Richardson, Polar Regions (1861), pp. 298-331; Marknam, Arctic Papers of the !&amp;gt; . G. (1875), pp. 163-232 ; Simpson, Ibid, pp. 233-275 ; Hans t cndriks the Eskimos Memoirs (&quot;Geographical .Magazine,&quot; Feb. 1878, et seq.} Brown, Races of Mankind, vol. i. (1872), pp. 5-20 ; Countries of the World, vol. i. (1877), pp. 123-144. See also the works and papers referred to in the foregoing work?; the diction aries and grammars of Fabricius, Washington, Kleinschmidt, and f.inssen, and a sketch of the Eskimo language by Dr Rink in course of publication by the Smithsonian Institution ; and finally the various narratives and other official reports and papers of the Arctic voyagers, particularly those of Tarry, Lyons, Franklin, Colhnson, M Clure, Graah,Kane,Rae,Hayes,Hall,Bessel9,Koldeway,and Nares. (R. B.) ESKI-SAGRA, or ESKJ-ZAGRA, a town of European Turkey, province of Adrianople, is pleasantly situated on the southern slope of the Balkans, 70 miles N.W. of Adrianople. The vicinity is highly cultivated, and there lire some well frequented hot mineral baths. Eski-Sagra has 13 inosquss, several Christian churches, and a bazaar. Its principal manufactures are carpets, coarse cloth, and leather. In the Ilusso-Turkish war of 1877, while occupied ly the Russians, it was threatened by the Turks under Suleiman Pasha, and General Gourko advancing to its rolief suffersd a disastrous defeat (July 31). The Russians were compelled to evacuate the town, and retire through the Lower Balkans, after which it was set on fire by the Turks, and great barbarities were perpetrated on the Christian inhabitants. The population of the town num bered about 20,000. ESKI-SIIEHR, a town of Asiatic Turkey, in Asia Uiuor, in the sanjak of Sultan Oegni, about 80 miles S.E. of Broussa, and 130 miles W.N.W. of Angora, to the south of the Purssak-Chai, a tributary of the Sangarius, in 30 3 2 E. long, and 39 43 N. lat. It consists of two portions, the town proper and the market-town, united by acausev/ay about a mile and a half in length. There are at least eight or ten mosques ; and the market town contains three or four natural warm baths, which are mentioned as early as the 3d century by AthenaBus. About 18 miles to the east are extensive deposits of meerschaum, which yield a yearly revenue to the Government of about G0,000 piastres. The clay is partly manufactured into pipes in the town; but the greater proportion finds its way to Europe and especially to Germany. The annual export is estimated at 2200 or 2500 chests, of a total value of 35 millions piastres. Eski-Shehr, i.e., the old town, is identi fied with the ancient Dorylseum of Phrygia, and it still preserves some sculptures of the Roman period. Its name appears about 302 B.C., in connection with the wars of Lysimachus and Antigonus ; and it is frequently men tioned by the Byzantine historians as an imperial residence and military rendezvous. In 1097 it was the scene of the defeat of the Turks under Kihdj-Arslau by the crusaders under Geoffrey of Bouillon. ESNEH, or ISNE, the Latopolis of the Greeks, a town of Upper Egypt, on the left bank of the Nile, 28 miles S.S.W. of Thebes, in 25 17 38&quot; N. lat. and 33 E. long. Its position at the upper end of the Nile valley, which here widens out to a breadth of 4 A- miles, is greatly in its favour, and it forms an important depot in the caravan trade from Sennaar. The local manufactures are shawls, cottons, and pottery. It has frequently served as a place of refuge for the political exiles of southern Egypt, and at tiie time of the French expedition it was occupied by the Mamelukes of Hassan, Osman, and Saleh Bey. More recently it ha.s been the custom to transport thither female offenders from Cairo. To the south of the town lies a Coptic monastery which attracts a large number of pilgrims from far and near to visit the relics of the martyrs who were put to death at Esneh during the Diocletian persecution, 303 A.D. The population of the town is estimated at 30.000. For an account of the ancient temple of Kneph, see EGYPT, vol. vii., p. 782. ESPARTO, or SPANISH GRASS, Macrocfdoa (Stipa, L.) tenacissima, Kunth, is a plant of the tribe Slipeae, resem bling the ornamental feather-grass of gardens. It is indi genous to the south of Spain and the north of Africa, and is especially abundant in the sterile and rugged parts of Murcia and Valencia, and in Algeria, flourishing best iu sandy, ferruginous soils, in dry, sunny situations on the sea coast. Pliny (.V. //. xix. 2) described what appears to have been the same plant under the name of t?parlum, whence the designation campus tsparlarius for the region surrounding New Carthags. (See CARTAGENA, vol. v. p. 140.) It attains a height of three or four feet. The stems are cylindrical, and clothed with short hair, and grow in clusters of from two to ten feet in circumference ; when young they serve as food for cattle, but after a few years growth acquire great toughness cf texture. The leaves vary from six inches to three feet in length, and are grey- green in colour ; on account of their tenacity of fibre and flexibility they have for centuries been employed for the making of ropes, sandals, baskets, mats, and other articles. Ships cables of esparto, being light, have the quality of floating on water, and have long been in use in the Spanish navy. Esparto leaves contain 56 per cent, by weight of fibre, or about 10 per cent, more than straw, and hence have come largely into requisition as a substitute for linen rags in the manufacture of paper. For this purpose they were first utilized by the French, and in 1857 were intro duced into Great Britain. In 1877 the total imports of esparto into the United Kingdom were 174,720 tons, being 43,809 tons in excess of the quantity imported in the previous year. When required for paper-making the leaves should be gathered before they are quite matured; if, however, they are obtained too young, they furnish a paper having an objectionable semi-transparent appearance. The leaves are gathered by hand, and from two to three hundredweight may be collected in a day by a single labourer. They are generally obtained during the dry summer months, as at other times their adherence to the stems is so firm as often to cause the uprooting of the plants in the attempt to remove them. Esparto may be raised from seed, but cannot be harvested for twelve or fifteen years after sowing. The increased demands of the paper trade have led to forced cropping in some districts, where in consequence there has been a falling off of from 2 to 10 per cent in production. For the processes of the paper manufacturer esparto is used in the dry state, and without cutting ; roots and flowers and stray weeds are first removed, and the material is then boiled with caustic soda, washed, and bleached with chlorine solution. Sundry experiments have been made to adapt esparto for use in the coarser textile fabrics. Messrs A. Edger and B. Proctor (see C/iem. News, vol. xxxv. p. 141, 1877) have directed attention to the composition of the slag resulting from the burning of esparto, which they find to be strikingly similar to that of average medical bottle glass, the latter yielding on analysis 66 3 per cent, of silica and 25-1 per cent, of alkalies and alkaline earths, and the slag G4-6 and 27 45 per cent, of the same respectively. For further details concerning the manufacture of paper from esparto, see the article PAPER. ESPINASSE. See L ESPINASSE.