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Nelson Evening Mail, Volume V, Issue 53, 4 March 1870, Page 2

The impecunious state of the Borough Council at Hokitika may be inferred from the fact that at its last meeting the Town Clerk reported that there had been no payments during the week. The receipts had been a deposit on a contract, £10. Stockowners in the Mataura district, Otago, appear to have suffered, severely by a recent flood. A Mr. M'lSfab is said to have lost 4000 sheep, besides horses and cattle; Captain Boyd 2000 sheep &c.s and other parties both in stock and through destruction of crops. Flaxmills are becoming numerous in the Waikato, Auckland. Seven or eight mills are at present at work there, some of; which turn out three tons of prepared flax by the week. It is stated that about a dozen other mills are in course of erection in that districr. The miners of Auckland ought to be rich iudeed, if the following calculation) given by the Southern Cross, be true :— * '• The following figures,, which may be relied upon as authentic, will show the expense involved in working quartz reefs» We may observe that the claim is con* sidered a very good one :— " Quart 2 crushed, 306 tons, yielding 6390z Bdwt lgr, producing £1,401 11s. 6d.; average value per ounce, 435. 9d.j average value per ton of quartz, £4 lls. 6d.j average yield per ton, 2oz 2dwt; average amount of quartz produced per week (for 20 weeks), 15tons 6c wt. Average cost per ton for wages only (this item includes labor on permanent improvements to the mine), £2 7s. lOd.j expense of getting* carting, charges, and crushing, £1 14s. 2d.s total cost per ton, including crushing £4 2s. * 8

A Baza_a.r, held on behalf of a new Presbyterian Church, at Wangauui, realised upwards of £500 towards the building fund of the church. The value of the machinery employed on the quartz reefs at Bendigo, Victoria, on the end of 1869, is estimated at £370,000. During the latter half of the year these reefs yielded at the rate of SOOOozs. a week, the average return being lO^dwt. to the ton. A Stranger visiting New Zealand, and remaining long enough to acquire a knowledge of our manners and customs, could scarcely avoid characterising us as the most unsocial and selfish people in the world. Each Province is so wrapped up in its own affairs that it seems quite indifferent to what its neighbors are about, except their actions are likely in some ■way to affect itself. The most important social concerns of neighboring Provinces are passed unheeded j " they are of no interest to us," is the cry. Canterbury carries on important public works, and attempts great social reforms, in which latter particular she sets an example •worthy of praise and imitation. We dont care, it is not our business. Otago is •developing goldfields which promise to excel the Thames in richness — we look on ■with the utmost apathy. We hear of the scarcity of labor in some places to such an extent that the crops are left retting on the ground — well, let them rot. We shall never get on while this state of things continues. We must begin to lose this isolation, to forget provincial distinctions, and to consider ourselves one people, if we mean to occupy that position among the Australasian Colonies Nature has afforded us the means of filling. — ■Post Is it not a humiliating consideration (says the Post) that there are among us men of our own race — making great professions too of being of the " salt of the earth" — who are continually using their Utmost efforts to undermine secretly the measures adopted for the pacification of the country through maudlin sympathy with the savages who stand in opposition to us, principally because their skins are brown ? We know that their are unprincipled men who, tempted by large gains, are criminal enough to sell arms and ammunition to the Maoris, but their guilt is venial compared with, that of those who systematically stir up the embers of insurrection. The Wanganui Chronicle^ of a recent date, tells us that " some Maori translations of Earl Granville's last despatch are reported to have been circulated among the King natives. The authorship of the translation is attributed to Mr. C. O. Davis, of Auckland, who was some years ago tried on a charge of high treason and acquitted." This Davis is Manuwhiri's correspondent; ■" the true," " the love of old," &c, as •styled by that apostate priest. How long •would Mr. C. 0. Davis be at large in one of the frontier states of America •were be as partial to Indians as he is to Maoris ? As a sample of Chinese enterprise in Australia, we do not remember to have met with anything to beat this. It is from the correspondent of the Rockhampton Bulletin, on the Gilbert diggings :—Vegetables are now brought in regularly by the Chinese from their gardens, 55 miles 'distaut, at reasonable prices.