SLUDGE-CHANNEL " SCARE."

Kumara Times, Issue 919, 10 September 1879, Page 3

SLUDGE-CHANNEL " SCARE."

"That it is the wish of the miners that Mr Gisborne urge on the Government the necessity of altering the present grade of Said sludge-channel, as ■«* WE feel assured that with the present fall, it will not answer the requirements it was meant to serve." The above is, in my opinion, more the wish of some of the gentlemen who formed the deputation that waited on the H 01. W. Gisborne, Minister of Mines, on Tuesday ~, the 2nd inst., raiher than the wish of S the majority of miners who, like mypelf, kuew nothing about such a thing having taken place until seeing an account of it in the Kumaka- Tijiks of the Blh inst. As the presumptive interference (if these gentlemen with a snhjeoc they evidently know but little about may be the means of retarding ior an indefinite period a work that if allowed to proceed would, when completed, give renin iterative employment to a thousand anxious men, I purpose giving a few extracts from \\x Thur.:au's mission to California, wbi-h appeared in the Australasian Supplement df Julv 14, 1877, wherein it.will be seen that the grade given to the proposed Knmara sludge-channel compares favorably wiih that of one 'of the most systematically worked mines in California. As Mr Blake, Mayor of Kumara, at" the sariie tiine lirged the necessity of immediate supply of more water for the rr-quirem-nts of this goldnYld, it will not be out of place if I commence my quotations by saying that Mr Thuieau, in giving a description of the North Bloomfieid Gravel Mining Company's Mine, savs :—"Their reservoir holds when full 920,000,000 cifbic feet of water. Their ditches, or ran s have such a Capacity as to deliver 44 million gallons of water daily a distance of 40 miles, which is equal, to 3,200 Californian 'miners inches' into three main dis Iril.uting pipes, each of whidh commences with a diameter of 30 inches, ilecrea-in;.', however, to 15 inches diameter near the works ; and these ugairi supply each three or font- ' nozfc'es' as need he, which latter measures from four, to nine inches at their delivery. By means ot ingeniously constructed joint* and balance wights, 1 could lift and direct a 9in. nozz'.e almost anywhere, and what required seven or eight men formerly is done by one miner at present. The jet of water, 9in. thick, s'rikes the opposite bank, 340 ft. in height, at a distance of 400 ft. ! The effect upon the gravel is remarkable, f>>r large rounded quartz boulders, over haif a t'<n in weight, are trundled along by the stream just the same. a*s balls in a bfi\vli:ig ally. I saw - myself not less than 340 ft. of a vertical bailk of this gravel gradually underminded and afterwards bodily removed by water." " Each nozzle," he goes on to say, " can remove, in the ordinary, from ?■ to acres of gravel per annum." All this gt-ivel passes through sluiceboxes 6ft. wide, and have a grade what of he calls '' 4| per cent 1 ' and when I te.ll the readers of this article that that fall of 4J per cent is-but a t'ine over onehalf an inch more in 12t't. than the fall proposed tor- our sludge-channel they will aotee with tiio that the Dillman's Town deputation " scire" was an unnecessary one. S. B. FT.