The Lake Wakatip Mail. Queenstown, Wednesday, August 10, 1864

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 134, 10 August 1864, Page 2

The Lake Wakatip Mail. Queenstown, Wednesday, August 10, 1864

The late floods have caused not only material damage, but a moral effect on the miners has been produced which may for a time tend seriously to diminish our population. The river workings on the Shotover and Arrow rivers are, with few exceptions, entirely swamped, and the loss of mining material has been necessarily very serious. We are no alarmists, nor do we wish to give undue prominence to this subject in order to raise a pathetic howl over the decadence of the prosperity of the district. We should not be doing our duty, however, if we attempted to ignore or gloss over evils which rather require to be bravely met and grappled with. We long ago pointed out the desirability, nay, the urgent necessity for the employment of associated labor and capital, in order properly to develope the resources of this gold field ; and the recent calamity aptly illustrates our argument as to the inefficiency of individual enterprise to overcome the physical difficulties presented to successful mining in this district. Miners, like sailors, are a reckless race, and even had they the time to spare would, in most cases, not take the trouble to render their claims really secure from the rise of a few feet in the rivers, which may be looked upon as likely to occur at nearly all seasons. No one who experienced the terrible weather of last winter could have had a doubt, from personal inspection, that the first flood, or even freshet, would seal the fate of the majority of the river workings. The wing dams were insufficient, both in height and strength, and all preliminary operations of this nature were evidently hurried over in .order to get at the washdirt with as little delay as possible, and work the claims out. It is only natural that small parties taking up grQund should act in this way, some few instances of success luring them, on and the stem pressure, may be, of poverty forcing them to strike for the gold at once, to the neglect of ordinary precautions. It is not that the greater extent of the areas of the river beds is really unworkable and their vast deposits of the precious metal buried for ever, &s some of our despondent friends would have

it; but, to obtain those riches a certain expenditure of capital and labor is essential, which the ordinary working miner cannot in any way afford. We do not presume Cor a moment to recommend the foi mation of Joint Stock companies by the score, or any such cumbrous and expensive machinery; but wc would suggest to the mining community and those interested in their success the great advantage of men working in large associated bodies; and we believe that the Goldfields department would do all in their power to adapt the Regulations to meet the case with regard to size of claims, protections, rights of water. S;c.

Mining leases might also with great advantage be made available, although at present the Regulations, as published in the Gazette, practically restrict them to areas of alluvial ground and quartz reefs. The Government, though stubborn and consistent in sticking to old forms, however bad, could hardly resist the pressure which men with vr.tes woulp exert in pursuance of an object important to their own interests. The Goldfields Secretary, if we are to believe his Report, would jump at the opportunity of assisting " associated bodies of miners." Instead of leaving the district in disgust and giving up ground certainly auriferous, and in all probability very" rich, because, according to all anticipation they have been flooded out and have all their work to do over again, let the miners set to work with a will and join together to repair damages and ensure future security. Let them in this way workout the riverbeds gradually, but surely, and they v-'ill find better returns in the long run than by rushing about from one place to another in the vain search for what does not exist in this country —a poor man 's diggings.