SOME EXPERTS.

Greymouth Evening Star, Volume XXXI, 21 January 1901, Page 2

SOME EXPERTS.

Gold dredging is occupying a good deal of public attention throughout New Zealand at present.-and promises to take a still more prominent position ere long. The industry has apparently brought into existence an immense number of " mining experts," who give to their friends and the colonists generally "their expert opinion" with all the glibness of a clown in a pantomine and with about equal reliability. How often do we hear of Mr So and So having visited the Coast, inspected our dredging areas and emphatically pronounced either in favor or against with all the authority of one who had been bred and brought up among miners, and had a life time experience of such matters. An enquiry into their past knowledge, however, too often reveals the fact that these so-called experts were never in a mining district before, that their practical knowledge of gold is confined to what they have seen in sovereigns or jewellery. Yet of such are a number of those gentlemen who visit the Coast, and instruct our miners in matters they have been accustomed to deal with all their life time. As well might miners go to agricultural or pastoral districts and instruct farmers how to fatten cattlo and shear sheep. The peculiar part of the matter is the fact that the outside public accept the opinion of pseudo experts, and as a natural consequence are very often led astray. The evil will cure itself in time. In the meantime a good many will be misled.