VICTORIA.

Grey River Argus, Volume IX, Issue 728, 17 September 1870, Page 4

VICTORIA.

[leader, September 3.]

Mr Darby, whilst digging at the rear of his hotel, at Rushworth, found a nugget weighing 31 oz lOdwt. The Gray town journal learns that there is a good deal of surface gold in the same vicinity. Auother fine sample of Berlin gold from Catto's paddock was brought into Inglewood on Saturday. It consisted of fonr nuggets and a little fine gold, weighing in all 61oz 4tlwt 3gr, the largest piece being 340z lldwt.

A correspondent of the Ingleivood Advertiser reports that several miners have been working for some time past in a gnlly near Yorkshire Flat, about nine miles north of Wedderburn, but little or nothing was heard of their doings until last week, when it became known that several nuggets had been obtained there, two of which, weighing over 3>>z and 7oz respectively, were sold in Wedderburn.

We learn from the Advertiser that another splendid lot of nuggets have been found at Berlin. They weighed altogether 621 b, and were got during the last fortnight in and near Catto's paddock, Berlin, within a foot of the surface. "The weights of the several nuggets veve as follows :— 1770z, 161oz lOdwt, 102 m 7d\vt 12gr, 80uz, and soz. These were got by Lorimev and paity within the paddock, and at a depth of Bin. A. 40oz piece was got by Griffith and party in the claim adjoining Loritner's, and 30oz in a claim a short distance further on the run. M'lntosh and party, in their road claim outside the paddock fence, got three pieces weighing 71oz, 70oz, and 360z 15dwt. The shallowness of the run from which these line nuggets were taken, together with the nature of the stratum in which they are embedded, which is a red clay free from pebbles of any kind except golden ones, has given rise to a new species of mining among the loafing fraternity at Berlin, namely, probing for nuggets. Lately the cluimholders, on coming to work of a morning, have noticed numerous small round holes in the surface of their claims, and a closer inspection showed that a rod of some kind had been used by some ingenious rogue or rogues to probe the ground to a depth of about a foot, for the purpose of discovering in an easy way the presence of the nuggets which might be lurking below. To put a stop to this little game, the claims are now regularly watched throughout the night." " Few people are aware," says the mining reporter of the Ballarat Btar, "that tub and cradle men, working with the implements used in the primitive days of Ballarat, are now mining at Sebastopol — not in surfacing or shallow sinking, but down deep under ground, in the workings of some of the old monster companies. Four hundred feet below the surface small parties of miners have their claims and work away on their own account, quite independent of the company, its mining manager, and captains of shifts, going to work when they please and working as long as they like ; knocking off for a smoke, a chat, or a meal, whenever they wish, and, in fact, carrying on as they did in the days of old. These small parties of miners are now known by the style of ' fossickers,' and pay so much per week to a company for the right to ground that has been more or less worked, or in new ground in small nooks and corners where it would not pay the company to mine. They can get through a lot of stuff, for they wasb their dirt below and use a tub and cradle. There is no winding to the surface, and water is plentiful, so that the washdirt has not to be removed far from the ground it is broken out of. Old timber left in the mine is used for props, and sets and drives in old ground are filled up after they had been used and the wash rendered accessible by them has been blocked out. Some do very well when they get on a patch of good dirt, while at other times long hours are worked in air that is at times far from good, for a small return. The sums paid per man for the right to mine, or, rather, to become a 'fossicker,' vary — LI 10s or LI or less being the rent paid to the company. The ground is denned, and the 'fossickers' have claims within a claim, and operations are carried on to the benefit of both lessor and lessee. The tub and cradle below afford a great contrast to the large iron puddling machines, buddies, and sluices above ground, and this system of mining, besides being peculiarly unhealthy, is likely to be peculiarly dangerous, as being less under managerial control as to the timbering and so forth."

" A discovery that promises to give an impetus to quartz mining in Ballarat proper has been made," says the Star, "at a spot which, may bo described as being between Sweeney's slaughteryard and Vale park. Tho discoverers are Clarson and party, and it seems that they recently commenced work in an old shaft, and after filling up a portion opened out at 80ft from the surface. They were rewarded by striking a body of quartz that proved to be a lode of some six feet in thickness and rich in gold. Our informant states that the reef crosses the head of the old Inker mann lead, and people who have inspected it have sanguine hopes of it proving a very valuable discovery. One person, a competent judge, said it was one of the richest reefs he had ever seen. Four claims have been taken up, and two parties claim one of these areas. The ground in which the reef was struck has been placed under offer to two brokers, who will most likely commence to form a company. The old shaft was put down by people prospecting for quartz, but it seems that they missed finding the lode." MININO ON THE UPPER MURRAY. [PROM THE 0. AND M. ADVERTISER.] For years past small parties of miners

have at various times sot in on the Cudgewa, Wheeler's, and other creeks, which have their rise in the Australian Alps and flow into the Upper Murray or Hume River. In most of these streams gold in small quantities is everywhere met with, and also black sand, the tin ore of commerce. For various reasons, however, principal among which was the high price charged for stores, the efforts made at extracting the precious metal and minerals have been of rather a desultory character. Some ten or twelve years ago, Mr Howitt, while acting as leader of one of the prospecting parties- sent out by the Government, reported very favorably of Wheeler's Creek, and also in a more modified manner of the Cudgewa Creek, as a field for mining operations. The reports led up to nothing ; but the large increase of settlement that has taken place on the banks of the Upper Murray, through the operation of the present and previous Land Acts has had the effect of directing attention to the mineral resources of the locality. From a party of miiiers at work on the Cudgewa Creek, Mr Peter Wright, Government contract surveyor, has forwarded a sample of tin ore obtained, to Mr J. Cosmo Newbery, for analysis, to which the following reply has been received: — : "The sample consists of stream tin, associated with a little iron Baud, and a few specks of gold ; an assay gives 52.15 per cent, of tin." In connection with the claim where this sample was obtained, it is said that the black sand is found not only in the washdirt, but for several feet in the gravel above it. Of course the distance somewhat detracts from the value of the discovery, as the cost of carting the sand to Yackandandah, the nearest town, amounts to about L 5. Still, in spite of this, we hold to the opinion that the whole of these tributaries of the Murray will one day be worked, and although nothing in the shape of "pile-making" need be expected, yet many men who are now complaining of hardness of times and difficulty of procuring employment, might, in the locality referred to, by dint of hard work, knock out a very comfortable subsistence.