The Evening Star THURSDAY, OCTOBER 26, 1876.

Evening Star, Issue 4264, 26 October 1876, Page 2

The Evening Star THURSDAY, OCTOBER 26, 1876.

If social-essay writing ilousished in New Zealand, "The Philosophy of Mining lushes " would furnish. an excellent ilieme for an essay. The manner in which men abandon occupations at which they are earning a decent livelihood, in order to take t part in a "rush" to a vew gcllMH is unacjountable on any prindyies of reason. It , is •><><; even necessary that g.-;U should, have been ijund in payable quantities to ©suite the mining frenay—<nm satra/tunet. Let " the raeh to Oiin«rari lMt y tar betokens*

an example. TW tbo belief that a goldflelcl •xisted rented on little else titan a vague npposition. it Vetoed probable that the jold deposits at the Thames extended >ver the neighboring county; and at various timeß, indeed, it wm whispered About that So-and-so with his party had been aecretly prospecting upon the Ohineaiun block, then in possession of the Natives, md had secured a certain qu intity of gold by way of reward for his enterprise'; but no substantial reason justified the conviction which pervaded the miuds of the Thames aimers, and led them to bring immense pressure to bear upon the Government to secure the freehold, if possible-but at any rate the easehold—of tha block. When it was at length announced that the latter had been acquired from the Natives, and that the Ohinemuri would be opened for mining purposes on a particular day, all the Thames-pit might ttot be going too far to •say, ftll Auekhnd, was set in motion. The utmost excitement prevailed—intrigues were begun for obtaining miners' rights surreputioualy, so as to euable the holders to get the pick of the field; and when the day of >p*nin£ at last came, the Thames miners descended upon the Ohinemuri like a deluge, and apread themselves over miles of ground, pegging out every inch of it as claims. The bubble so»n burst, and the ' uman tide ebbed as quickly as it had flowed. Where the prospector has lighted upon some rem.rkably rich deposit, there is, of course, a justification for a *ush, because the first comers have naturally the choice of the ground, while the lawdlers are obliged to take the leav"igg, and could reliable information be

ibtained the justification would become the stronger. Where the discovery has been made n a distant country, in such a case, the Ugger, if he intends to go at all, is bound .0 go at once, otherwise]- he loses all chance »f success. Men, however, start off just as xcitedly to new "rushes" eituated in

;asily accessible places, and concerning rthich full information has been published ">y persons whose express business it is to ascertain the true capabilities of the new ijoldfield, and who have reported upon their capabilities in very moderate terms.

The accounts which have reached Dun-

fdin from various quarters as to the prospects of the Kumara goldfield certainly do iot warrant the stir which the news of the i iKcn-ery of this field has caused amongst ur laboring population. Fortunately the it'll is in a part of the country which •ciiderH it «?asy to gain a pretty accurate idea >f tiio st:ito of affairs there. Kumara is ;itrated on t>ie (Jreymouth and Hokitika ■'■l'.d, about halfway between the two towns •earhr; those names, and the ." lead" seems

to be tie old bed of the Tcremaktu River. The gold is found on the elopes of two opposing raises of hills and in the bottom of the '.a 1 y between, the Binkiug ranging from -)t,. to lf>ffc. at th>; bottom "of tho valley to

from i2oib. to 150 ft. on the hillsides. The sinking is thus not very deep, but a considerable outlay is entailed in consequence of a layer of loose shingle and immense boulders requiring to be pierced before the gold is reached ; while, in order to work the claim, a long tunnel one is mentioned as being 1,400 ft. in length—must be driven through the hills to the river. Thus it is useless for a man to go to the Kumara without (sufficient money to support himseli for two or thrte months, and to pay his share of the expense of timbering his claim and of removing the boulders. The work, too, is excessively hard, and when the digger has spent his money, and undergone two or three months of preliminary labor, what is his reward ? Upon this particular and most important point all authorities concur. The average earnings of the Kumara miner, when he has struck gold, are from £3 to £4 r week, while the best claims—and there are" very few of them—return £lO or £l2 a week a man. These are reasonable wages, but scarcely attractive eDough to induce a working man to throw up a situation and spend his savings in order to get there. Trade is dull just now; but mechanics in employment can still earn £3 or £4 a week in Dunedin—sometimes more—while the labor is less severe and the comforts of

the town are decidedly preferable to the hardships of tent-life in the West Coast bush The real merit of the Kumara seems to consist in its being, to all appearances, a goldfield which will offer permanent occupation to those who secure payable claims. It covers a large area of ground—its precise extent being yet undetermined ; and the washdirt is in places 40ft. thick, and that too upon a false bottom. Consequently a man without family ties, who is out of employment and Das a little money at command, might do worse than try his luck at the Kumara diggings, provided always that he is not afraid of downright hard work and "roughing it" into the bargain, although even a man of this stamp must remember that 0,000 persons are already on the field, and that there is no proof of its being sufficiently productive to support them. To the genuine old digger, who graduated in Otago in 1861 and the two or thr;-e following years, the hardships of the Kumara will not seem appalling. He could not, in those days, moui t a stage-coach and drive along a wellmetal] el road to his destination, or get his goods and chattels carted from town for L 3 a ton, like the Kumara miner.; but his succcshoi'3 have grown more luxurious. It is, howev.r, rat Ivor to the tyro than to the regular miner that those observations ara r.d.iieascd ; and the pith of thorn is a warning to man not to give up situations for the purpose of joining the army of diggers at the Kumara. There is just now a lack of water on the field; but this wrnt can bo supplied by artificial means. The Waimea water-race, upon ths construction of which L 90.000 of Government money has been spent, as it was feared, u-sel ssly, can fortunately be made available ; but it w:ll first be requisite to construct a reservoir, and, allowing for the proverbial deliberation of Government move-

inents, some monfehs will elapse before the race can be depended upon for a water Bupply. In the meantime mining operations will be retarded, and those miners who cannot obtain a supply of water from other sources will be spending money without immediate return, which is an additional reason for caution in proceeding to the scene of the rush. The Colony, however, must always regard with satisfaction any increase in its gold production, and the opening up of a fresh and valuable goldfield would be doubly welcome at the present time, because it would furnish employment for that superabundance of labor which has been making itself felt recently, and by inducing an influx of miners from other countries augment the consumption of dutiable articles and so swell the Customs revenue.