HYDE.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume VII, Issue 363, 18 February 1876, Page 3

HYDE.

(From our own correspond3nt.) February 15th. The work on the roads connecting Hyde with outlying places is being pushed ahead now, while the weather offers favorable facilities for such labor. A party of men, under the supervision of Mr. Prendergast, started last Monday to make some portions of the track between the Gorge and Hamilton, and tenders are invited for the formation of fourteen chains of road, including two small culverts, contiguous to the township and trending Gorge-ward. Other six or seven men are effectively busy making a new track across the Main G-ully and along the sideling opposite tlie township of primitive times. The object is to avoid a dangerous piece of sideling, pinch, broken ground, and bad culverts on the original route, but it will again turn into the existing highway when these obstacles are circumvented. This divergence will be also beneficial miningly, as some blocks of ground are thereby set free for hose and pick that could not have been profitably worked otherwise.

The parties at the deep sinking are stilly penetrating "mto the bowels of the hna," but it cannot be said, like Richmond, " without impediment." Since I last advised you the Star of Otago Company have had some very hard seams of rock to oppose and pierce through in their tunnel, but a favorable change has again taken place, and the driving has again become much softer, with clayey veins inseaming the face as they press forward. >buch signs arc regarded as harbingers of speedy egress out.of the money-consum-ing and labor-compelling adit into—let it be hoped—the soft, deep, and wealth-laden ground. The other party—Engleson's I must, call it at present— have abandoned the shaft they partially put down, owing to the watvr, while waiting for slabs, having considerably damaged it. They are now hard and fast at work on another one, this time with plenty of timber to carry them through. People seem to have a notion of the deep-sinking country, for I am creditably iuformed that a claim is taken up between the ground of the two parties already mentioned and the Four-Mile by some men from Cromwell, theCarrick Ranges, or thereabouts. They too are going in for a twelve-acre slice. I shall shortly be in a better position to speak ot mining matters in that, neighborhood. There are a couple of men engaged " crevicing " in the Taieri, a mile or so above Mardling's Ferry, with at least wages-making success, which I take to be 10s. or 12s. per diem. Mr. Petrie, the Government School Inspector, made an official visit here last Thursday. He expressed himself satisfied with the school management and the general proficien-y of the scholars, particularly of the more juvenile classes. During the examination some members of the Committee were in attendance. On the previous day he had made an examination of the school at Macraes, and I have heard the result was favorable to teacher and scholars. He left this place after the examination the same day (Thursday.) for Hamilton, in pursuance of his inspectorial duties of the --chool there. I hear he goes thence to your town—the capital of Maniototo, as sometimes heard i: called.

It has been intinated to us, through Mr. de Lautour, that Mr. Donald Keid's visit of inspection to Strathtaieri would take place on the 16th instant. If so, he may pxpect a hearty reception, as he is regarded as a man of the right identity stamp, and one who—for a " fellow-feeling makes us wondrous kind"—having sprung from the people himself, will not turn a deaf ear to ths demand for a fair consideration of their just and important interests. Should he arrive at the time appointed, as anticipated, I will endeavor, if practicable, to spnd ycu an account of the visit, proceedings, &c., in time i'or publication in this issue. The weather for the last few days past lias been very boisterous—high, parching, north-westerly gales, which still continue wil/iout any appearance of cessa 'ion The harvest, though, yet goes 11 eerily forward, at.d the " cockies ' say there never were such crops. On some paddocks, Mr. Flamank s especially, from seventy to e 'f?hty bushels the acre are spoken of as the probable yield, and other fields, too, are mentioned as nearly equally prolific. Ihe standing corn is of Brobdignagian dimensions, reaching a height of six, and in a few spots leven feet, with n correspondingly long, well-filled ear.