Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1881-05-27

In order to begin at the beginning-Ret to
the bottom, as it were, of an elevator--one
must climb to the very top. The building is
perhaps 150 feet long by 75 feet wide, and,
like all of its class. it rises so feet or more to
the caves, above which q narrow top part. 40
or 80 feet higher, is perched upon the ridge
pole. It is built of wood, sheathed with cor
rugated iron little way up, and then slated
the rest of the way.
Entering one end, where two railway tracks
run into the building, we find a narrow wood
en- stairway and begin our ascent. The flights
are short ones, but eighteen are stepped over
before we emerge into the topmost attic.
Alongside of u.s. as we climbed, has been run
ming the strong belt which carries the power
from the great engine on the ground-aoor to
the gearing in the roof-a belt of rubber can
vas, four feet wide and perhaps 25G feet long.
When grain is brought-perhaps hundred
carloads from the vast fields of Dakota or the
wide farms between here and St. Paul-the
train is backed right into the elevator and
stands SO that opposite each car door is a re-
ceiver, which is kind of vat or hopper, in
the platform. By the help of steam shovels,
operating almost automatically, two men in
each car will in ten minutes or less empty the
whole train.
As fast as the grain is dumped the receiver
delivers it into iron buckets holding about q
Na~AAf
and travel up a sort of chimney, called q
'leg," to this roof chamber These buckets
will hoist 6000 bushels an hour at their ordi-
nary rate of speed. That is equal TO one
bucket going up "a, 600 times, at the rate Of
400 times a minute-tolerably lively work
To-day up here in the topmost loft there is
nothing doing, and we are saved strangula-
ton. The light hardly penetrates through
the cobwebbed windows, and the most pull
verous of dust lies everywhere half an inch
deep, showing the marks of few boot soles,
many footprints of rats, and the lace-like
tracks of hundreds of spiders and bugs. You
step over and under broad horizontal belts as
you make your way gingerly from one end of
the attic to the other. They run the fans
that winAow the grain as it comes up In buck
cts, after which it is dropped into the hoppers,
ten feet wide and twice as deep, tina. open
like hatchways every few feet in the centre Of
the floor. Now all is perfectly quiet; we are
so high that even the clamor Of the wharves
does not reach us. But when the machinery
starts in motion, then fearful roars, and clash
of cogs, and whipping of slackened belts, as
sault the garret, until this whole upper region
rocks like ship in gale, and chaff and dust
cloud the eyes and stife the throat.
Descending one story, we find another gar
ret, with nothing in it but the square bodies
of the hoppers. Going down a second fight
shows us that the hoppers are not suspended
upon pillars, but loosely on iron stirrups, 30
as to shake a little, and the iron gate which
let's on or shuts off the fall of the grain thro'
the tubular orifice at the bottom is operated
by steam.
There are twelve of these hoppers. Stick
ing up through the floor underneath each one
cape the faring mouths of twelve spouts or
sluices, all of which point directly at the gate
in the hopper, as though earnestly begging
its bounty Of grain. Every one of these IA
spouts leads into bin, near or distant, and
all are numbered, so that the superintendent
knows which spout conducts to any one bin,
and can distribute his cargoes accordingly,
the result of his choice being recorded in cab
alistic abbreviations upon blackboard close
by. A movable conductor is swung into place
between the hopper and the spout, the gate
pulled open, and down slides the wheat with
musically rushing noise into the grateful
bin.
To see the bins we descend again, this time
reaching the top of the wide part of the build
ing. We walk very circumspectly, in the
half-light, amid a maze of beams, stringers,
and oross-pieces of wood and iron. The
whole interior of the elevator below this level
is now seen to consist of a series of rooms
between which there is no communication.
They are ceilingless, and the only exit from
them is through spout in the bottom. Peer
ing over the edges from the narrow foot-walks,
Fe can only guess how far the person would
fall who should lose his balance, for the eye
cannot reach the bottom-it is 65 feet below,
and hidden in darkness. OF those deep bins
there arc IA, some twice the size of Others.
Sometimes they are all full at once, and hold
800, 900 or 900, 600 bushels, weighing 80, 000,-
900 pounds and good for over 200, 900 barrels
of hour.-Hdrpers Magazine.