The Port Darwin Gold-fields.

Cromwell Argus, Volume V, Issue 217, 6 January 1874, Page 7

The Port Darwin Gold-fields.

(Dail'ii Times.) On more than one occasion we have warned the miners in this Province against putting ■ faith in the glowing reports circulated regarding the gold-fields in, the Northern Territory ■<if South Australia. Nevertheless, from time to time, men have been unable to resist the temptation of going to those gold-fields, and we have not heard of any of them being particularly enchanted with the change. It is • now generally known that the highly-coloured accounts respecting the North Australian gold-fields emanated from Adelaide. scripbrokers ; yet, despite the knowledge of this fact, a few of the miners still cling to their former belief. It may tend to remove their doubts if we quote a few statements recently made on the spot, at Palmerston, one of the townships that have sprung up there. In the newspaper just established there, we read an account of a meeting of miners, at which some very strong language was used by the speakers regarding the reports by which they had been induced to proceed thither. One of them declared that “ It was not a gold country. There wore no well-defined reefs ; s and .the hills were all iron-stone. There was no.alluvial gold,-no proper reef, and no real diggings at all.” These statements are re-

ported to have been received with cheers, and the same speaker was also loudly applauded when he declared that “he had not seen live ounces of gold got in the Territory during the eighteen months he had been here,” The other speakers delivered themselves in a similar strain. One of them said : “ It was a country of ants, flies, and starvation, and men would be fools to remain here • • . . . , There were no diggings, and the whole thing was got up by promoters who wanted to float companies and swindle the public.” On the other side, while the non-existence of alluvial diggings is not denied, it is alleged that there are reefs, but it is admitted that very little has been done to develope them, and also that share-swin-dling has been rife.. When these admissions are placed in juxtaposition to the oft-repeated assertions of rich crushings and protestations of hmxajuhs with which the Adelaide journals have teemed for months past, one may be pardoned for doubting whether payable gold exists at all in the Northern Territory. But even if credence be given to the statement that payable reefs have been found there, no reason now remains for anyone believing in the existence of alluvial diggings. That bubble is fairly burst, and should therefore deceive no one. It is now evident that any Otago miners who go to seek their fortunes there must he prepared to go in for reefing, and that with .very problematical results. If these facts be generally recognised, wc do not think we shall lose many more of our miners.

There is a Chinese proverb to the effect that “ he who leaves first gets the best hat.” The results obtained bv a party of three miners, at Whitechapel Fiat, Arrow, (says the OiKxnrtr,) for three and a'half' weeks’ sluicing ]>rior to their Christmas v.'ero 124 ozs. 5 dwts.