BANNOCKBURN.

Cromwell Argus, Volume IV, Issue 174, 11 March 1873, Page 5

BANNOCKBURN.

| (From an occasional Correspondent.) I have often wondered that the Bannockburn does not furnish you with a correspondent. The district is both large and prosperous, and one would fancy plenty of material could be got for a letter every week. For myself, I have hardly the necessary ability, and as I know of many better qualified, I hope some one or other of them will take the matter up. Most correspondents start with the weather, I notice ; but as that is so very dry, I will try something else. Mining matters, I suppose, are of most interest and importance to readers in a mining district. Well, in connection with that industry, we have had two visits of the Warden lately. The first was to Pipeclay Gully. It appears the bed of the gully has been worked some three times <'J 7 er, and the only occupants now are a party of three, who hold an ordinary claim in the bed of the creek. There are, also, something like twenty men employed tunnelling in the terraces on each side. These men, it may be mentioned, are all doing well, as high as £2O a week having been made. ]S T ow, it appears, according to the present law, that any party Working in the bed of the creek can compel others using the water to let it run down to wem, or down its natural course. . The party of three mentioned have lately caused the law to this end to be put in force, and thus some of the tunnel claims have been stopped from work. It really seems a very hard case that claims on which hundreds of pounds have boon spent, for the purpose of getting wem into working order, should be stopped work to allow two or three men to fossick about in ground that has been worked over «W over again. However, the tnnn-dlors nave made application that the gully be de-

dared into a main tail-race or sludge-channel, and if the application is granted, the declara-1 tion will effectually stop any further trouble so far as Pipeclay is concerned. Still, it is ■ evident that the law sadly wants altering, ; for there are other terraces in the district which might be worked in the same way. The subject might fitly be discussed by our Miners' Association.—The cause of the Warden's second visit was a dispute in Bailey's Gully, mainly about erecting a dam ; but as I have not heard all the particulars, I will not say anything more about it. I am veiy much pleased to say that the Foresters' Court here seems in a prosperous condition. A goodly number of new members have recently been made. It is surprising that a great many more of the young men do not join—the cost is so trifling. The subscription is only a shilling a week, which would hardly be missed. It has, you might almost say, got to be the kind of fashion when anyone is unfortunate enough to get hurt or to be taken seriously ill, at once to get up a subscription for his benefit. But it is rather hard that men who pay regularly for a doctor for themselves should so often have to put their hands into their pockets to assist some one who has been doing as well as, or perhaps better than, themselves. However, if our Bannockburn Court goes on to increase in numbers at the present rate, it ought soon to be a rare thing to encounter such subscription lists. The Committee of the Bannockburn and Carrick Eange Miners' Association has had two meetings since its election. The whole of the members were present at both meetings, lam told. The business got through i so far lias been principally preliminary ; but j the miners generally seem inclined to go into ! the affair with great spirit, and the num--1 ber of members is increasing fast. I !_ I