THE WOODSTOCK RUSH.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume III, Issue 660, 12 June 1882, Page 2

THE WOODSTOCK RUSH.

The “ own correspondent ” of the Lyttelton Times writing under the dates June 2nd and June Bth respectively, says: —The rush is progressing favorably. A large number of claims have bottomed on payable gold since I last wrote, and a few have not proved payable. But people’s ideas here of what is payable and what is not payable are very different from what they would be in some parts of the world. For instance, I heard the other day of a man abandoning his share in a claim, because it only paid him L2 a week, and it would not pay hiip to work for L2 a week he said. You may judge from this of the deplorable state to which working men in Westland are reduced.

We have not as yet found much benefit from the now rush in Hokitika, as the work hitherto done has been chiefly preparatory, but when the water is got in, and the claims are in full work, then we shall find a change. The population of the new rush consists mainly of West Coasters, and we have yet seen nothing of the promised influx from Victoria and New South Wales. The returns hitherto have not been sufficiently large to attract miners from a distance. The advantage of the discovery of a new goldfield is that it gives employment to a number of those who have for some time past been either unemployed or employed unprofitably. A large number of our miners have been working at claims which gave very small returns ; most of these men have gone to the new rush. The extent of ground now proved will give profitable employment to the men working it for some years to come. It would be well if Canterbury men who have had no experience in gold mining, were to associate with some old West Coasters, as I hear that one party of Canterbury men have sunk a shaft three times the usual size. The shaft has been described to me as a regular paddock, being 9ft by sft instead of 6ft by 3ft. This involves an immense waste ;

of labor and time, and should the claim prove a duffer a corresponding amount of discouragement. I have so frequently warned men not to come over here unless they Imre the means of supporting themselves for”some weeks at least, that it is wearisome to have to repeat the warning. But I" have heard to-day of two young fellows from Canterbury who were wandering about absolutely destitute, without the means of procuring a meal, and they were in* debted to the charity of an hotel keeper for a bed and a breakfast. One of them I heard was evidently well educated. The Intngah.ua Herald of the 6th inst. says that the advance in the Keep-It-Dark scrip is inconsequential relatively to the vast increase in the yield. Fully 300 ozs. of gold are said to have been obtained on Friday and Saturday ; while parties working in the mine are prepared to pick a ton of stone which will yield a hundred-weight of gold. A 31st division of 3s per scrip has been declared, equal to L 3,000