MINING INTELLIGENCE.

Evening Star, Issue 3899, 23 August 1875, Page 2

MINING INTELLIGENCE.

(From our Exchanges.)

The Crown Terrace Q.M. Co. are sinking on the reef to test it more fully. The mining population on the Waipori goldliebla numbers about seventy Europeans and about 000 Celestials. The ‘ Chronicle’ learns that a party of Chinamen have leased the Band of Hope water-race for a term. The price has not transpired. The wreck of the pneumatic tube is still lying partly submerged. No attempts being made to recover it, and there is no one to look after it. Mr Buchan’s new dredge at Han is Beach on the VI olyneux has been launched, and will be ready for work in a few days. The necessary machine! y has arrived, ana no time will bo lost m fitting it m position. The prospecting at Arthur’s Point for the •Miotover lead has sustained a check, yields not having been so favorable lately; but it is hoped that the works now in progress will result in a permanent revival of mining there. Ground sluicing operations are being carried on with average success up the Waipori River, several of the claims paying more than wages ; and with a larger supply of water on to the spurs, there is no daunt but r number ®f mmen

could find profitable employment. Messrs Bolton and party, who have a large sluicing claim, a-e employed driving for the purpose of obtaining a better fall to their tail-race. The German Hill Q.M. Co. having secured their claim, will hold a meeting at once to allot shares and set men to work. It is somewhere about the line of the Criterion reef, but in higher country, and the prospects are considered favorable. 1 he Naseby sludge channel works have been hanging fire the last few weeks through no fault of the contractors. They have waited •nd waited till given the levels the channel is to take, ihe ‘ Chronicle ’ understands there has been a good deal of difficulty in keeping the *h® n i na tnrally have been very discontented. The engineers are all held to Provincial works bo tightly at present that there is no Dl&me on their shoulders. Messrs Robe its and Co. have a prospecting claim on a line of reef that crosses the road between Lawrence and Waipori—about a mile distant from the last-mentioned place. They have a shaft down 90ft., and are carrying the lode with them. The reef is from six to nine inches in width, and shows a little gold. Hopes are entertained that payable stone wiU shortly be reached. At Queenstown the weather is still keeping extraordinarily fine for the season, and there has been very little snow or rain this winter. The river-workers are now hoping to be able to finish their paddocks ; for although the power of the sun is increasing, there is very little snow on the ranges to increase the volume of water in the river. The Rising Star Company at Arthur’s Point have nearly finished their paddock, and intend to turn the river again. The Cooper’s Reef Co. have started work, and only a favored few were allowed shares, as it is thought likely to be a good thing. These efforts have the merit of being in the right direction, and solely of local enterprise. It is felt that onr quartz resources have been too long neglected, and the depression in mining here is due to that neglect solely. It will be two months before any further prospecting can be done at the Twelve-mile, although that locality bids fair, from what is yet known, to become an important quartz-mining centre. An old Californian miner who has been working in Bush Creek, and who has had experience in quicksilver mines, seems confident that he has discovered deposits of that mineral extending over some distance. He says that the deposits occur in patches in the rock, but the matter will have to be taken in hand more efficiently in order to test the value of the supposed discovery. This mineral would be a valuable adjunct to any quartz discovery we may be lucky enough to make in the time coming

Mining matters throughout the Cromwell district are not very lively at present, and there i- little news of any interest to report. A scarcity of water is universally felt, and a heavy snow-fail is much desired ; otherwise summer workings will be retarded. Various quartz-raining companies are engaged preparing for crushing—making roads to mills, &c.—and ne.'rt month will probably show a considerable in returns from this class of mining—the maiden crushinga from the Crown and Cress, ' arrick, and Rooney and Jones’ claim, Bendigo, giving promise of good cakes. During last week a fourth share in the Bannockburn ® ,ace Company changed ownership at the handsome figure of overLSOl), and the ‘ Argus’ is told a similar prici was offered the remaining proprietor, Mr Goodger, for each of his three shares, but refused. Water property at Bannockburn and Garrick—indeed, throughout the whole district—is each year becoming more valuable, every supply commanding extensive areas of payable auriferous ground. ihe ‘‘ Flower of Wheat ” writes to the Cromwell ‘ Argus ’ with reference to a caution that paper had inserted against miners or intending speculators having anything to do with a quartz-reding company projected by the Flower. ’ He says :—“ I was not aware until reading your paper that the ‘ Marlborough Kxpress ’ hid ever written any thing against me, and I am quite sure that it was not justified in doing do. . . . There ara not many diggers in New Zealand but know the ‘Flower,’ as they call mo I am on the diggings about twenty-five years, in Victoria, New South Wales, and New Zealand, and I can defy any man to sav I have done him an injury. I have never had my name slandered in a newspaper before, but on the contrary have been frequently praised for my lucky prospecting. I have never received one shilling (except from my mates) to assist me in prospecting. I have had shares in reefs in Victoria—Mount Black wood in 1855. and in Bendigo in 1857 ; also Adaioug, ;'.S.W., and several in New Zealand. I ought therefore to have some knowledge of them. The good ones I sold, and the bad ones ! kept. 1 have wronged no one but myself, in drinking too much brandy. That I can alter, and will.—Yours respectfully, Thomas Wals i, alias ‘Flower of Wheat.’ Cardrona, August 11.”