MOUNT BENGER.

Evening Star, Volume IX, Issue 2613, 3 July 1871, Page 3

MOUNT BENGER.

(From our own Correspondent.) Fortune appears resolved either to smother our diggers with benefits or to starve them by her frown. In either case the result must prove equally fatal. After fervently praying for the past two years for a frosty winter, we have got one so intense that it is almost as bad as a high flood. Several of the beach claims have either been knocked off or coin pelled to lose half their time by the want of water to turn their wheels. Others have ban their flaming frozen, and come have had their very pumps disabled by the keen tooth of Jack Frost. This is the more annoying, as all hands are on good gold, and likely to earn enough to make up for the bad time.throughout the two previous seasons. One claim at the Teviotis, lam reliably informed earning something like L 250 per week, and in many others the wages of the shareholder.-, cannot be less than L2 or L 3 per diem. If the frost, which is generally allowed to be the most intense since Hartley and Riley’s year, continues, the river will sink low enough to permit of forsicking on a large scale. If your Dunedin unemployed have pluck enough to risk the venture, there is good chance for them to make a rise. Perhaps, however, they aie fonder of bullyragging the Superintendent than of hard work. A meeting of miners resident on the Miller’s Flat block was held on Satmdaj evening to protest against the projected sale of the land. The attendance was large and respectable, and the greatest unanimity prevailed. Among others, the following important resolution was carried with enthusiasm. It is an adaptation of the Monroe doctrine to the Colonics, with the “diggings for the diggers ” for its watchword, and, in the humble opinion of “your own,” is deserving of serious consideration : that is, if our present rulers a-e competent to consider anything. The resolution was:—“ln the opinion of this meeting, common justice demands that a class so heavily burdened with special taxation as the mining community should, within the goldfields, be afforded special facilities for securing a home for themselves and families. Resolved, therefore, that the goldfields members be requested to introduce a measure securing a prior right of selection on all blocks thrown open within goldfields to the bonafde miners actually resident on or near the block.” Another item for the great collection of Ana. Scene : bar of ap up-country tavern. Enter excited, an inebriated individual : Is Mr Balderdash, M.P.C., within.” “Fie is,” replies mine host, nosing a future shout. “ Tell him I have come on important, most important business.” The message is delivered, and “one member,” blandly important, enters. Anxious individual gazes steadfastly on him for ten minutes by the clock. At last M.P.C. gets tired, and inquires the business of his “friend.” “By Jing,” stutters out the gazer, “they told me your father was a Hottentot, and I’m hanged if he musu't have been the ugliest one ever foa’ed.” Exit impertinent, amid a volley of oaths and decanters. A new Industry has be n organised in this quarter. Turkey farming is to be the speculation of the future. ( lie gentleman lus already started, aud is likely to have imitators. A charge for depasturing these savoury birds might enable our Trcasiusr to lessen his dificit in a creditable manner. To tax geese would be too severe on his own relations. .