GEOLOGY AND MINERAL RESOURCES. ATC11T1111 rocks are predominant, a ml in some districts, es pecially around the great lakes, they are over laid by Cambrian and Silurian formations. In large areas also the ancient rocks are covered by extensive glacial deposits of clay, sand, gravel, and erratic boulders. Triassie. Jurassic, and Cretaceous rocks appear only in Scania, in the ex treme south. Some time after the glacial epoch the Scandinavian peninsula subsided till the sea level, in relation to the land. stood 500, 700, and in some places 1000 feet higher than before, as is shown by marine deposits resting on rocks that had been scarred by glacial ice. Then the land began to rise again and the gradual upheaval is still in progress. The movement is best observed, of course, along the coasts. It is nowhere so rapid as on the Swedish side of the Gulf of Bothnia, and it is most rapid at the northern ex tremity of the Gulf, where the upheaval is esti mated at about 5 feet in the past century. In the extreme south no cbange of level has been ob served. Thus the Gulf of Bothnia appears to he slowly draining into the southern basin of the Baltic.
The mining industry competes with difficulty against the powerful rivalry of the leading Euro pean countries, although it is more important than that of Norway. Sweden is poorly supplied with coal (only 271,509 tons having been mined in South Sweden in 1901). .Manufacturers are
compelled to import coal or use charcoal. The most important and valuable mineral prod uct is iron. In 1001 2,793,566 tons of iron ore were mined in the kingdom.While about 1,000,000 tons arc mined every year near Gelb. and Dannemora, the largest supply comes from Gel livare (q.v.), 130 miles north of the Arctic Circle. Swedish iron is regarded as unsurpassed in the world, as it is almost entirely free from phospho rus (.05 per cent. or less), and is therefore of superior value for the manufacture of steel. For this reason it now rivals the ores of Spain in British and German markets. and large quan tities are exported. Magnetite and manganese ores (2271 tons of manganese in 1901) used in steel-making also abound. The copper industry of Falun was long widely renowned, but the yield was formerly much larger than at present (23.660 tons of ore in 1901). Three-fourths of the total yield of zinc ore (4S,630 tons in 1901) is produced at the Ammeberg mines, on the north side of Lake Vetter. The silver product in 1901 Was 1557 kilograms, and the yield of lead was 933.306 kilograms. The number of persons en gaged in mining declined from 35,000 in 1390 to 30,776 in 1901.