GOLD IN NEW GUINEA.

Globe, Volume IX, Issue 1203, 11 January 1878, Page 3

GOLD IN NEW GUINEA.

Some information with regard to the alleged discoverer of gold in New Guinea is supplied in the following quotation from an article on the subject which appears in tho "Otago Daily Times " :

We observe from telegrams published that a large vessel with enterprising pioneers is to leave London for New Guinea in February, incited no doubt by the information, of which we were recently advised by telegram, that a botanist, Mr Goldie, had announced, through the Besident Magistrate at Somerset, Cape York, that he had made a discovery of gold there. By reference to our telegraphic columns to-day it will be seen that a Mr Minton has contradicted the statement made by Mr Goldie, and on the grounds of his own non-success asserts that it is not gold but mica which Mr Goldie had discovered, and insinuates that Mr Goldie being a " mere botanist" was misled by the resemblance. Whether Mr Minton's surmise is correct or otherwise as to gold v. mica we cannot say, but we are in a position to say that his insinuation of ignorance on such matters on the part of Mr Goldie is without foundation. From personal knowledge of Mr Goldie we are aware he is not a mere botanist, but a gold miner too. In that capacity he resided for a considerable time on the Thames goldfield in the Auckland Province, and is quite as capable of distinguishing mica from gold as he is a thistle from a rose bush. He was in this city some ten months ago, on a trip round the colonies to recruit his health after his first visit to New Guinea, at which time he expressed his confidence, from what he had heard from the natives, that on his next visit he would find gold. We shall probably be able ere long to placo our readers in possession of more definite information on this interesting subject, as Mr Goldie promised to transmit to us an account of his explorations in the high lands of New Guinea by the first opportunity, which we assume was afforded by the same means which brought the recent information from him to Cape York. It was his intention to penetrate as far into tho interior as possible before returning from this expedition, in which his special object was the collection of living plants for transmission to his principals in London. To circulate a false rumor of the discovery of gold in New Guinea is neither consistent with the sterling and honorable character of Mr Goldie, nor would it be conducive in any way to his personal interests in relation to the country in which he has been reaping a harvest in his own peculiar calling. The idea of his mistaking mica for gnld, because he is a "mere botanist " is equally unlikely, so that whatever may be its effect on the opening up of that land of mystery, we have little doubt that the report of the discovery of gojd in, New Guinea is true.