The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, MAY 3, 1871.

Evening Star, Volume IX, Issue 2561, 3 May 1871, Page 2

The Evening Star WEDNESDAY, MAY 3, 1871.

Our Goldfields, so long neglected, are likely to become of increased interest during the session of the Provincial Council. It is intended to hold a sort of Goldfields Parliament, in which some of the goldfields’ members will have a seat, and the remainder will consist of delegates from various districts. In this respect it will differ from the Conference of Wardens, held some two sessions ago in Dunedin. The necessity for this proposed conference is plain enough when it is considered that from time to time changes in the modes of working gold-yielding ground require altered regulations ; for what will suit one phase of mining industry will be utterly unsuitable to another. For instance, when surface digging sufficed to employ some thousands of men on a square mile, and the yield was sufficient to satisfy every one with his earnings, extended claims would be out of place. They would have given to the few a monopoly that would have acted injuriously to the best interests of the Province. Equally absurd would it be to retain the restrictive regulations applicable to surface mining when expensive machinery became necessary to profitable working. In the first instance, the only investment required is the purchase of a pick, a shovel, and a long tom, which must bo considered as moveable machinery. In the other, fixed plant, constructed at considerable labor and expense, are required, and some security must be offered both as to extent of area and tenure, before men will incur the risk and expence. We do not know that in these respects any Government has been very remiss. The legal requirements of the goldfields have received some attention, but this is not all that is required to render them attractive. We have often endeavored to draw attention to the fact that something is requisite before even gold mining is adopted as a fixed and settled pursuit. One principal reason why the proposed conference is necessary, is to consult as to the best and most profitable means of supplying the goldfields with water. But in the interests of the Province much more requires to be done. Notwithstanding the stereotyped phraseology “ practical miner,” and “experienced miner,” and other words of similar import, we have seen sufficient of practical and experienced men in all industrial pursuits, to know that a little of the knowledge of what others have discovered is a very valuable adjunct to their own practice and experience. We have seen instances where practice and experience have been sorely puzzled how to do what a scientific man made plain in a few words. We want population on the goldfields—not a pauper population, scarcely able to make wages, hut a population of intelligent miners, who follow it as an occupation which they know how to make profitable. Twenty years have passed away since gold was discovered at California and Australia. The first stream of miners was drawn by the report that gold lay on or immediately below the surface of the soil, and that no skill nor training was required to get rich. That generation has passed away, and with them much of the excitement of gold mining. The descendants of the first miners have been educated in other pursuits. From the nature of the case, mining was followed by their fathers as a means of quickly realising capital, and then forsaking an occupation which precluded the settlement of a family. It was a sort of nomade life, full of adventure, not devoid of interest, but almost as undesirable for a family man as if he were a soldier in the field. The men of this day know more of the real profits of gold seeking compared with those of other industrial callings. They know that something more is required than a swag, a tin billy, a pick, and a shovel. To succeed, either the country itself must be known or a person must be so well instructed in practical geology as to say, like Hargraves, with some sort of certainty, “ where is a likely spot for gold ” ; and, having found it, they must know how best to go about getting it. This is not learned by instinct. Thousands of instances are on record of men unable to make a living upon claims that have proved fortunes to others. They will not risk what they have made without seeing prospect of good returns. One great point to which the attention of our mining conference must therefore be directed, is not merely to contrive means for securing the prosperity of our present miners, but for training up others to work the fields

with advantage to themselves, with comfort- to their families, and consequently with profit to the Province and the Colony.