66 GEOGRAPHY OF THE BRITISH ISLES.

Britain the lead among the industrial nations of the world. Iron-working, in England and Wales and Southern Scotland, is on this account so cheaply carried on, that few other countries can compete with us in the iron markets of the world. Rather less iron-ore is now mined in South Wales than formerly, owing to the enormous and rapidly-increasing import of cheap ores from Spain and other countries. Spain alone now sends us upwards of 3% million tons of iron-ore, out of a total import of 4 million tons.

The annual production of iron-ore in the United Kingdom is about 11 million tons, from which nearly 4 million tons of metal are produced.

The chief iron-mines are in South Wales, South Stafiwrdshire, Yorkshire, and Southern Scotland. In Ireland, the richest deposits of iron-ore are in county Antrinz. From the clay-baud ores of the Clepeland hills around MIDDLES- BOROUGH, one-third of the iron smelted in England is produced, while the red hematite ores of North Lancashire and Cumberland supply the great steel works of BARROW-IN-FURNESS.

Besides the vast deposits of coal and iron, there are productive ores of tin, lead, copper and zinc, and some gold and silver are also produced. Slate, clay, salt, and other minerals are found in abun- dance.

Rich deposits of tin and copper ore are found in Cornwall and Devon, but more tin, and much more copper (either in the form of ore or partly refined metal) is now imported into, than is produced in, the country. Ores of lead, some of them containing silver, are found and worked on both sides of the Pennine Range and among the Cumbrian and Welsh mountains, the Wicklow Hills in Ireland, and at Leadhills in the south of Scotland. Zinc ores are found in the Isle of Alan, and in Wales and Northumberland. A little gold is pro- duced from gold-ores worked near DOLGELLY, in Merionethshire, and a con- siderable quantity of silver is produced by the desilz/erisation of lead and copper ores.

Slates are extensively quarried in Wales, chiefly at BETHESDA, LLANBERIS, and FESTINIOG; building stones, granites, and marbles are largely quarried in various parts of the country; in the eastern and south-eastern divisions of England, the clay in which they abound supplies the chief building material-— brick; and great quantities of china clay are sent from the south-western counties of England to the potteries of Staffordshire. More salt is produced in Great Britain than in any other country in the world; it is chiefly derived from the rock-salt mines of Cheshire and hVorceslers/zire.

5101111141131 of the nzirzeraljfiroduce of the United Kingdom.

(1892.) I.—METALLIC MINERALS. Iron. Lead. Tin. Copper. Zinc. Gold.‘ Ores raised (in 1,ooo tons) . 11,312 4o 14 6 26 IO Value in £1,000 . . 2,970 295 734 12 m4 9

of Suva, of the value of £44,998, were produced in 1893, chiefly from lead ores.