MINES. 27 



on account of the cost of transporting the ore on reindeer 

 to Stromsund's iron furnace. About the end of 1790 

 the mountain was purchased by an iron founder named 

 Hermelin. In the neighbourhood there were many locali- 

 ties fitting for the erection of furnaces and forge hammers ; 

 for instance, Wassero An, half a Swedish mile from Gelli- 

 vare, Wuosko Backen, and Nattavara, five Swedish miles 

 from Gellivare. Hermelin did not avail himself of any of 

 these, but endeavoured to transport all his ore down to the 

 furnaces on the coast of the Bothnia; but want of labour 

 and expense of transport beat him. 



In 1800 the Swedish Government took the affair in hand, 

 and in 1817 a committee was appointed to examine and re- 

 port on the best means of transporting the rich ore, which 

 is to be found not only in Gellivare, but also in Afner Kalix 

 and Jukkasjarvi, and they made their report in 1818. They 

 proposed to join the rivers Lina, Angesa, and Kalix through 

 a line of canals; and thus transport the ore down on a 

 large scale. I may add, that Gellivare lies within a short 

 distance of the river Lina, in about 67 north lat., and about 

 200 miles to the east of Neder Kalix on the Bothnia. Other 

 engineers approved of this plan of forming canals, but they 

 suggested that furnaces should be built and the ore smelted 

 in the neighbourhood. In 1827 Herr von Scheele, a man of 

 great practical ability in the affairs of mines, surveyed the 

 spot, and proposed to lay a railway from Gellivare to 

 Storbacken, on the great Lulea river, and then transport 

 the ore by water down to Lulea ; and when I was up in 

 Lapland in 1862, this appeared to me to be the most 

 feasible plan. 



The decrease of the ore is owing entirely to the increased 

 cost of transport. During the last, and early in the present 

 century, the Laps only received for transporting the ore on 

 their reindeer twelve Swedish miles (or nearly eighty Eng- 

 lish), to Edefors and Spiken, from which places the ore was 

 carried to the furnace, 30 Ib. of flour, or one-half a species 

 dollar (2 rqr.) per skeppund. In 1836 one skeppund (400 

 Ib.) of Gellivare iron ore cost about two and a half, but, 



