As is generally the case in Sweden, the ore of Fahlun forms considerable masses, the chief being a vast reniform lump 1,200 feet long and 600 broad at its upper surface, and gradually narrowing as it descends. Near this gigantic _stock_ are situated similar deposits, which though of smaller dimensions are still very considerable. From the copper pyrites being deposited chiefly on the circumference or the outer shell of these reniform masses, which are themselves of extremely irregular outline, the mining operations are carried on with great difficulty, and exhibit a perfect labyrinth of crooked and winding galleries, situated at various depths, and supported by pillars or sometimes by walls—a peculiarity which explains the successive fallings in that have formed the enormous pit of Fahlun. The mine has been worked from time immemorial, and is said to have been known even before the Christian era. The oldest document extant bears the date of the year 1347, and contains the privileges granted to the proprietors of the mine by King Olaus Smek; but still more ancient documents are mentioned, among others a purchase-deed of the year 1200. As the ores are poor, their abundance alone renders the working of the mine profitable; but Fahlun has seen its best days and is doomed to a gradual decline. During its greatest prosperity it is said to have yielded 5,000 tons of copper annually, but in 1866 it furnished no more that 600 tons, or about one-third of the entire production of Sweden. In 1719 a body, preserved from corruption by the vitriolic water with which it had been saturated, was found in an abandoned part of the Fahlun mines. When it had been brought up to the surface, the whole neighbourhood flocked together to see it; but nobody could recognise a lost friend or kinsman in its young and handsome features. At length an old woman, more than 80 years of age, approached with tottering steps, and casting a glance on the corpse, uttered a piercing shriek and fell senseless on the ground. She had instantly recognised her affianced lover, who had mysteriously disappeared more than sixty years previously, but whose image she still bore in her faithful memory. As he was not employed in the mines, no search had been made for him underground at the time. Most probably he had fallen, by some accident, into one of the numerous crevices by which the surface of the mines is traversed. Thus the tottering woman, weighed down with the double burden of infirmity and age, saw once more the face of her lover as she had looked upon it in the days of her youth.