The Evening Star TUESDAY, MAY 11, 1875.

Evening Star, Issue 3810, 11 May 1875, Page 2

The Evening Star TUESDAY, MAY 11, 1875.

Tm “ Report on the Goldfields of Otago” by Mr 6. tt F, Ulrich, F. 6.5., can, perhaps, scarcely be considered as being of such a nature as to be very Interesting to the general public. It consists, for the most part, of rather dry details regarding the various “ auriferous quarts reefs and crushing machines of the Province of Otago, with remarks- on .auriferous drifts and occurrences, of copper ore, , cinnabar, grey antimony, and brown coal in different parts of the Province.” Nevertheless, a more- important report than this has not been laid on the Council table during the present sees'on. This report is calculated to give a high idea of the. mineral resources' of the Province, and to produce the impression that if the wealth of Otago realised from this source is not so great as that which has been obtained in districts of equal size in Victoria, there is yet every reasbuto be hopeful as to the future. There i ene point empoitdlV worthyofnotice in thisreport, Mrwufioa says that the “ quarts reefs in Otago exhibit a resemblance—in many respects every close fine—to Victorian reefs." On this resemblance he grounds his opinion that our reefs will be found, as the Victorian ones are in many oases, fee prove richer as the depth of the mines increases. Many of'our old Victorian readers will remember the bad effects produced by the too great respect paid to the mere opinions of scientific men on this point. It was;commonly believed that it was an invariable rule that the richness of a quarts reef decreased with the depth. Sir Rodskick Murchison, judging from the - experience which he had then gained on the subject, stated it as his opision that the Victorian reefs would be found to , follow this rule. Fortunately for Victoria they did not, and many a claim that was abandoned in the old days as a rank “duffer” is now yielding splendid returns to those who have had the pluck to sink deep enough. Mr Ulrich seems to think that the Otago reefs are much more difficult to discover than those of Victoria, which for the most . partcrop out” at the surface; but he points out that when once our reefs are found they are nearly sore to b® auriferous, while a large proportion of the Victorian ones are not worth working. It is pleasant to learn that there are reefs com-* paratively close to Dunedin which will probably prove to be «payable ” The Saddle Hill Reef is one of &ese, and another still more promising is on the rightiand side of the mam road leading from Dunedin to the J*»en. w ith regard to the so-called Ported bello Reef Mr Ulrich seems to be puzzled, This reef appears to be; a- real, htsys naturm. It seems that gold is to be found in this “ reef ” in rocks in which it ought not to be found, and, in short, that Mr Ulrich has never before met with anything at all like it. Still he thinks that “it would be reaHy deplorable if the still lingering doubts as to reliability of the results of the trials mSHe, i.e, , whether the gold really oame .out of the stuff and not out of the crushing machine, were net definitely set at rest, by a further and more extensive trial, say of ten or fifteen tons from each of the two good places. There is one thing about this report that will bring hardly pleasant reminiscences to many of those Dunedin people who have been shareholders in up-country qnartz-mining companies. It has been said that the mam object aimed at by enterprising storekeepers, hotelkeepers, mining agents, and others, in organising'and conducting companies has been to provide the mining populations around them with werk of such a kind as to bring in regular wages, so that they themselves might get their lititlc bills paid. The people of Dunedin are supposed to have contributed very large sums towards ‘his desirable object. It must be confessed that .my one who reads through the accounts of t!• c w • kings of the various mining companies wi 1 be induced to believe that some instances, at all events, where energy and capital have bein most woefully misapplied, this tlury is not very far from affording a planeib.< solution of much that without it must seem inscrutable.