FINLAND : NATUEAL EESOUECES. 221 



0Î Sveaborff (Wiapori), crowning seven rocky islets which command the channel. 

 Still Helsingfors is mainly a commercial town, doing a large trade with England 

 and Hussia, though its shipping has recently fallen off in consequence of the rail- 

 way now running to Hango Head, at the extreme south-west point of Finland, 

 where the sea remains open much longer than at any other port in the countr3^ 



Helsingfors is the chief entrepôt for the two inland towns of Tavastehus 

 (Hameenlinna) and Tammerfors (Tampere), the so-called "Manchester of Finland," 

 with several factoiies of textile fabrics, and paper-mills worked by water-power. 



East of Helsingfors are the small seaports of Borga, Lovisa, and Freden'ks- 

 hamn, near the latter of which are the extensive Pytarlaks granite quarries. 

 South-east of it the fortified island of Kotka commands a roadstead, where is 

 stationed a naval flotilla. Near the Kussian frontier the coast is broken by the 

 bay, or rather fiord, of Wihorg (Wiipuri), at the northern extremity of which 

 stands the city of like name, ranking third for population, second for trade, and 

 first for shipping. Large vessels, however, are obliged to stop at Trmund, 

 8 miles farther south, and now defended by strong fortifications. St. Petersburg 

 is thus protected on this side by a second Kronstadt. The Saïma Canal, with its 

 terminus at Wiborg, affords steam communication to WUlmanstrand. 



Beyond the relatively populous southern seaboard, there is only one town of 

 any importance in the interior. This is Kuopio, capital of a government, and 

 founded in 1776 on an islet in Lake Kalla, about midway between Ladoga and 

 TJIeâborg. Its prosperity is due to its resin and timber trade. Ny-SloH — that is, 

 "Newcastle," or Savolinna — is merely a small borough between Lakes Haukivesi 

 and Pihlejavesi, notable mainly for its picturesque Swedish castle. Kekuhobn, on 

 Lake Ladoga, is also an old stronghold, which, like Scrdobol at the north-west 

 angle of the same lake, is now engaged in the timber and granite trade. 



Material Progkess. — Natural Resources. — Industries. 



Thanks to the development of its agriculture, industries, and trade, the 

 population of Finland is increasing very rapidly, having nearly quadrupled since 

 the middle of the eighteenth century, and doubled since 1815, though checked by 

 the famine of 1868, when nearly 100,000 perished of hunger and typhus. On the 

 southern seaboard there are already nearly twenty, and in the government of 

 Nyland over thirty inhabitants to the square mile, but elsewhere the ratio falls to 

 one-third of those figures. It should, however, be observed that of all regions 

 situated under the same latitude, Finland is the most densely peopled and the 

 best cultivated. Although enjoying a less favourable climate,since the isothermals 

 are here deflected southwards, she has a far larger relative population in a given 

 area than the portions of Scandinavia lying beyond the sixtieth parallel. Nor 

 has immigration much to do with the increase. In the government of Wiborg 

 there are some old settlements of Russian peasantry, who have retained their 

 religion, which is that of thousands of Karelians, formerly evangelized by the 

 Novgorod Russians. But, apart from the military and ofiicials, there are no more 



