ALEXANDRA.

Dunstan Times, Issue 495, 13 October 1871, Page 2

ALEXANDRA.

(from our correspondent.) The glories of Auckland and her Thames quartz reefs, I do not wish your readers to nfer are to be outdone by Alexandra and her metalliferous lodes at Conroy’s and Butchers, but at the same time I would em. phatically state'they are not to be sneezed at. Iversen’s reef at Conroy s, under the superintendence of Mr. R. Reid is in full swing again ; the mill and mine were at a stand still during the past week for want of timber, but a good stock being now on hand, the works will progress. The yield from the stone crushed averages somewhat about an ounce to the ton. On Butcher’s reef, work will shortly be commenced in the original prospecting claim. In the claim of Halliday and party twenty, each subscribing 2 01., have combined to thoroughly test the reef, and all are sanguine of their plucky enterprise. Two shafts have been sunk about fifty and sixty feet respectively in both of which the stone is struck. Pumping machinery driven by a water wheel is to be erected which will drain the reef. The head race for driving the wheel is nearly completed, and by an ingenious contrivance of fluming all the water brought up by the pump is carried back into the race again, and is thus utilised as part of the motive power. A trial crushing of a ton of stone from the claim was made two seasons back at the Rough Ridge, and yielded over one cunce to the ton, the next trial will be on a more extended scale, at Iversen’s battery, Conroy’s gully. From the alluvial workings throughout the district, nothing particular is heard. Knowles and Simmonds at the junction of the Fraser and Molyneux rivers, have erected a powerful water wheel and Californian pump, and are in full swing. The Ovens Company have also erected a similar plant on their claim on the Manuherikia, they are now busily engaged wingdamming the river to keep back the water from the ground they contemplate opening. The Manuherikia Company at Mutton Town Point, have struck a good seam and are making up for lost time. At their other working at Solomons Nob, they are getting through a lot of work and are making good wages. Sims and Bankhead, as also, Slaven and Alexander, Williamson and Dalziel 1 , Burke and Harding, Fisandiere and party and the other parties who are working’on the banks of the Molyneux between here and Clyde are as a rule doing well. At Butcher’s, Conroy’s, anil Blackman’s gullies, there being plenty of water, a good tew parties are at work ; in the latter gully, a coal seam has been discovered by Mr. Paget, who, I hear is making the ne- j cessary application fur permission to utilize it.