though as the neighbouring country is bare of wood, that article must
be dear. All the coal of Hoganas goes to Denmark; for the Danes have
entered into the war with Great Britain with so much zeal, that they
have prohibited the importation of British coal with which they used
formerly to he supplied; and as they cannot do without coal, they are
under the necessity of giving a higher price for Swedish coal of an inferior
quality: but such infatuation cannot be persisted in long; and as
soon as the Danes return to a sense of their own interest, the Swedish
coal must be either greatly reduced in price, or it must remain unsold.
I f the proprietors of the mine were wise, they would embrace the
present opportunity of endeavouring to extend and secure their sale,
by lowering their prices as much as possible. The fundamental maxim
by which all mercantile people ought to direct their conduct, i f they
understood their own interest well, is to take small profits, and to
secure an extensive sale.
The northern part of Sconia is primitive; and consists of gneiss
rocks, the same as Smoland. But the whole of the southern part belongs
to the class of floetz rocks. The neighbourhood of Helsingborg,
for at least twenty miles square, belongs to the independent coal formation,
and contains the very same beds that occur at Newcastle, in
England. The eastern part of South Sconia is similar in its structure
to the floetz track of Nerike and East Gothland, which has been
formerly described. The lowest bed is a conglomerate, which gradually
passes into sandstone. Over the sandstone lies a bed o f alum-slate, and
over the alum-slate a bed o f limestone, which constitutes the highest
bed of all. This structure is delineated in Plate XIII., fig. 9. Below
Malmo there occurs a bed of chalk, containing as usual abundance of
flints. Not having seen this track, I can give no account of its position»
with respect to the other rocks. The position of chalk is not yet well
made out. As far as my examination of this rock in the south of England
has gone, chalk always lies over sandstone, and between the sandstone
and chalk, there is a bed o f a kind of marl, consisting partly of
sand and partly of chalk. I have not been able to make out the nature
o f the sandstone in a manner quite satisfactory; but am disposed, from
what I have seen, to suspect that it is the third floetz sandstone of
Werner. By walking along the south coast o f England, from Southampton
towards Plymouth, the nature of this sandstone might be determined
in a satisfactory manner.
A t Andrarum, on the east coast o f Sconia, there is an alum work,
which has existed since the year 1637. The alum-slate contains crystals
o f pyrites and nodules o f an impure sulphate of barytes, which, according
to the analysis of Bergman, contains the following constituents:
Silica.................................................... 33
Barytes . . . . . . ........................... 29
Alumina....................................... 5
L im e .................................................. 3-7
Sulphuric acid and wa ter................. 29-3
100
Not far from this there is a lead mine: the ore is galena. It was
wrought from 1724 to 1739, I do not know if it is wrought at present,
hut rather believe not.
On the east coast of Sweden, opposite to Smoland and Sconia, there
are two islands, Öland and Gothland, the structure o f which it may be
worthwhile to mention. Öland is within a few miles of the coast,
and is a long narrow island, being 90 miles long, and from three to
ten miles in breadth. The whole o f this island is composed o f floetz
rocks, and is exactly similar in its structure to the eastern part o f
Sconia. The lowest rock of all is sandstone: over this lies a bed of
alum-slate, containing stinkstone and pyrites, and the uppermost bed
of all of a considerable thickness is limestone. This structure is represented
in Plate XIII., fig. 10.
Gothland lies a little to the north o f Öland, and farther east, being
situated, as one may say, in the middle of the Baltic. It is a high
island, its mean height above the sea being nearly 200 feet. Like
Öland, the whole of this island consists o f floetz rocks. Only two beds
have been ohserved. The lowest of these is sandstone, and the upper-
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