GREY VALLEY DIGGINGS.

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1309, 9 October 1872, Page 2

GREY VALLEY DIGGINGS.

[PROM OUB OWN CORRESPONDENT.] HaiiF-Ouncb, Oct. 7. Mabiile and party's claim has caved in from the surface, a depth of over sixty feet. The ground had been giving way for some time about the shaft, but the party did not think the claim of sufficient value to incur the expense of securing it properly. Fortunately ample warning was given that the accident was likely to happen, and they took precaution accordingly or the consequences might have been serious. The walls of the shaft came together at last with a crash, twisting the poppet-heads and slewing the surface machinery quite round ; it is now gracefully leaning with a rake to the north-west. The members of the party have set into work in different parts of the district. The collapse of this claim, and the dismemberment of the company is to be re« gretted. They did a good deal for the district in first demonstrating the e^istence of a continuqus deep lead, and afterwards showing by the admirable Bystem of co-operation they adopted in the prosecution and regulation of their work, how deep and wet ground, although it be poor, can be made tr> pay good dividends. The machinery erected on this claim was among the most complete and perfect mining plants on the West Coast. The principle adopted in its construction, viz., an adaptation of the law of gravitatiqn, combined with the simple plan of utilising hydraulic balance lifts, and making the waste water from the headrace by its weight do duty as the motive power, dispensed with the necessity of

erecting a wdter-wheel to drive the winxU ing gear. A large block of ground on the lead is left standing at the upper or southern end of the leasehold, and at the lower end it is of course all solid still. The lead is about 30ft wide, whero work was discontinued. The majority of the ' company now think that the gutter is i in Colreavy and party's old claim, and that its exact position will be right under Colreavy 'b hut, or the spot where that architectural wonder once stood. If this be so, an enormous amount of work has been done for nothing, for Colreavy's party and their successors have spent more than a year in constantly driving away from the gold— searching in an entirely opposite direction to where it really is to be found. Hafford's terrace is still the most important locality in this district" Gold has been struck in fresh claims, and there are several new areas taken up. It is remarkable, but true, that something good always does turn up in this neighborhood just at the very time it is most wanted. The wet lead was no sooner finished than this terrace was opened ; but it may be that if Hafford's party bad not worked out their claim on the deep ground just as the time they did, they would not have waited to prospect: the dry ground on the terrace. The rush to Australia : had not set in then ; if it had, such was the excitement a few weeks ago, that it is , feared very little prospecting would be commenced about Half-Ounce. A party : of Swedes have struck what is supposed . to be Hafford's lead in shallow ground on , the terrace above Mabille's leasehold, and . from a washing-up of the result of four j days' work, sozldwt was obtained, just [ about the exact amount of the magnificent l find which has caused all the uproar about I the Roper River. i Another attempt is being made to trace i gold into Hafford's terrace, from a differt ent direction, which, if successful, will c throw open an extont of auriferous ground r sufficient to employ Beveral hundred men. - Andrew Nicol and party, who :have a > f knowledge of the locality for years,' have c taken possession of an abandoned tunnel r in Frenchman's Creek. This tunnel was .. taken in by the former occupiers a dis- ;. tance of about 40ft. A high bar of reef c was crossed with deeper ground beyond ; ,s and Nicol and party have just sunk a a monkey shaft on the edge of the dip at r the inward side of this bar. The shaft c was bottomed on Saturday, at 12ft from i. the level of the tnnnel, and about 60ft it from the surface of the terrace. A little i- gold was obtained, but the ground is still h dippin ;, and if anything of value is found, }.. it will be necessary to tike in a new [ c tunnel at a lower level to work it. s- Frenchman's Creek heads in the direction )r of the Teviot, and both branches of it ie were worked four or five years ago. It t, joins the Half-Ounce Creek from the 1- west at the Mutton Town basin, and this ;r will doubtless account for the richness of >c the claims at Mutton Town. Hafford's [g and Gardiner's old claims are situated at ie the mouth of Frenchman's Creek. The' 3, latter is better known as R. M'Loughlan )e and party's claim, and, with one excepa - tion, it was the best ever worked in the 20 Half-Ounce district in deep ground. The a deep leads in the Grey Valley are always 3r richest at places where gold-bearing tri;e butanes join the present creeks on the k ll surface, or immediately below the point ■ iV of conjunction, and parties prospecting ie for the so-called Half -Ounce lead below [d Granyille would do well to bear this fact i 3 in mind. The lead is not lost, it has ) 9 merely scattered and become too poor to ,d work profitably, and there ia a reasonable [ c probability that opposite to the next goldie bearing feeder found' coming into it from $n the west— the- good ones afi come from Q) that quarter— the lead will "be picked up :h again as rich as ever. Following out this [ Q supposition, if it be correct, the simplest =it mode of looking for the lead would be to ta first prospect the shallow gullies along t p the range from Granville to r the* junction 's of Brandy Jack's Creek with the Totara 33 Swamp. In the upper parts of these i. gullies the gold is found on a false st bottom, and at a certain point it drops ;Q suddenly to a lower level, and' finds its 3r wa y along what is called the main bottom 3r to the original deep channels which form is bottoms of the deep wet gutters. This »d has been proved to be the case at Rowdy ti and Sullivan Creeks in the Duffer Creek to district, at Upper Half -Ounce, the >c Teviot, and Brandy Jack's Creeks, and at ie several places in the Noble's, Orwell s- Creek, and Nelson Creelf districts,, as well d as at No Town and Moonlight, •