MINING. England has great resources of coal, and annually produces over two-thirds of the coal output of the United Kingdom. There are two principal producing areas, the region about New castle and that of southeastern Lancashire, south western Yorkshire. northern Derbyshire, and western Nottinghamshire. The production of the former district in 1900 was: Durham, 34,300.719 tons; Northumberland, 11.514.521; and of the latter district, Yorkshire, 28247.249: Lancashire, 24,842,208; Derbyshire. 15,243,031; Nottingham shire, 8,626,177 tons. Other producing regions in 1900 yielded amounts as follows: Staffordshire. 14.222,743 tons: Monmouthshire, 3.929,177, and other districts, 11,998,888 tons. The yield of coal increases almost every year, and increasing amounts are annually shipped to foreign coun tries. England is the greatest coal-exporting na tion, because its mines are nearer to seaports than those of any other great producing country, and the largest coal-buyers are the neighboring coun tries of Europe.
England produces scarcely any of the precious metals, and of the others. iron is the only one that is produced in large quantities. The annual out put of iron is only exceeded in the United States and Germany. though the home demand is so great that the local production supplies less than half that used in home industries. A great advan tage of the iron industry is that the coal needed to fuse the ore and the limestone required for flux ing are found near the ore. Yorkshire supplies the greater portion, but north Derbyshire and Cumberland supply the valuable red hematite ores, while the black iron ore of Sweden and the hematite of Spain are largely imported. Tin ore is mined in Devon and Cornwall, the largest European sources of the metal. Copper ore is now nearly exhausted. In Northumberland lead and zinc are mined together.