CARDRONA.

Dunstan Times, Issue 287, 25 October 1867, Page 3

CARDRONA.

(from our own correspondent.) OCT. 22. In your issue of the 11th inst. a brief account of the mining progress of Cardrona appeared, and in it your readers were told that this old goldfield is growing young. On Monday last your correspondent was at Cardrona, and ascertained the following prospects of the district. Several years past, when these diggings were first opened, the ground was run over in the most slovenly manner, and the population, owing to Fox's rush, considerably decreased, and but little vitality has been visible in the locality until within the last two months. Soon after my arrival a friend very kindly accompanied me to see the various claims, and the first he pointed out was a good one. Last week the party washed out one hundred and nine ounces as the result of a week's labor, and the wash-dirt they have since raised is so pregnant with the yellow ore that two hundred ounces may be safely expected as the produce of the current week. The Pirate and Homeward Bound Claims arc in close proximity to this, and the owners of them calculate upon never unearthing less than eighty ounces in each claim per week. At a distance of about a quarter of a m'le above these claims a new one, the Fenian, has just been brought into working order by Colwell and party, and is likely to prove equal in value to any in the Cardrona district. Up the creek, for a distance of some miles, there are claims yielding handsomely. Dalgleish and party have, within the last month, brought in a large watei-race to work the terraces, and have already opened ground sufficiently rich to prove that the Cardrona diggings need not be confined to the table-land of the district. Bond and party are also bringing in a head race to sluice the old ground of the original prospecting claim, and countless other indications of life and activity are springing up in the district. I may with confidence state that in no district in Otago is there a more promising opening to miners of capital. Let the readers of the " Dunstan Times" distinctly bear in mind that there is no opening whatever fur a needy miner, and that any person short of sufficient funds to procure the necessaries of life and the furnishing of a claim for at least four months, must meet wifh onlv dis,ir>nointmeiit. T think two hundred additional miners, with moderate capital, might safely make a venture. Having said all that I deem necessary in connexion with the diggings 1 fancy that a few lines touching the social and commercial features of the place are desirable. The term social is a make-shift, by reason of my not having a more suitable word at my command. In a social sense the inhabitants of Cardrona are desirous of being, in the eye of the Government, a part and parcel of the Cromwell district. For many months in the year the ranges between the Cardrona arid Arrow are impassable, and consequently miners and men of business suffer inconveniences of a most serious nature, and to have all legal matters dealt with at Cromwell would be infinitely preferable. A memorial will in a fewdays be forwarded to the Government, praying for an immediate change of the present arrangements, and. as the road from Cromwell is passable at all times of the year, and the residents of Cardrona being more or less interested in the districts of Clyde and Cromwell, separation from the Arrow would Inadvisable. The main street of the town of Cardrona has been named High-street, and the men of business in it are a credit to the district. Mr. James Lawrence, of Cromwell, has opened a very extensive bakery establishment, and Mr. John Hetherington, also of Cromwell, has opened a general store not to be outmatched by but few on the goldfields of this province.