GREY EIVER UP-COUNTRY DISTRICTS.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume V, Issue 113, 14 May 1870, Page 2

GREY EIVER UP-COUNTRY DISTRICTS.

(From the West Coast Times, May 7.)

The various mining centres situated within the Grey Valley District may be said to be steadily improving. At Nelson Creek, the Deep Lead and Hatter's Terrace present their usual busy appearanceThe claims are progressing steadily, and those on gold are paying first-rate, and bid fair to realise the high opinion entertained of them by the miners. Try-again. Terrace is daily improving in appearance. There are numbers of miners engaged at work here aow, and, from what I hear, some of them are not doing so badly. The township looks pretty much the same as usual. lam told by the storekeepers that money has been scarce since the holidays, but that trade is slightly improving. At Red Jack's, things are looking rathei' quiet, the diggings still maintain a small population, engaged principally in sluicing claims, but a good many parties have left during the last three or four weeks for Paddy's Gully. Of the sluicing parties, Carpenter's party are in full operation, putting through large quantities of stuff. As they have a plentiful supply of water, they are enabled to work without interruption, aud have a good prospect before them. Frauk and party are busily engaged putting in a tunnel, and are making considerable progress in. their claim, which we believe to be a good one. The claim of Samuel Johnston aud party is also favorably spoken of. Weir and party, and several others have suffered considerable damage during the late heavy floods, but are getting into working order again as fast as they can. There are several other parties engaged in sluicing and tunnelling claims with varied success, some of these having been engaged hera for upwards of two years on the same ground. The busiuess people at Red Jacks are making improvments in their places, expecting, no doubt, that trade will improve by and by. Mr. Muir, the well-known storekeeper, is erecting a good-sized place, which, when completed, will be a credit to the locality. At No Town, matters remain much t! 3 same. The surveyor, Mr. Coe, has completed the laying out of the township, and also the surveying of the line of road from that place to the Twelve Mile, a distance of a little over five miles, and it is said that the road will shortly be com- | meuced. It seems that the Nelso . G-overnraent have determined to do sonrthing for the inhabitants of this district in the way of road making. At Paddy's Gully, matters are progressing steadily. There are a good many parties doing very well, but the rush is not likely to be of such extent as was expected by some parties. It is reported that a communication has been forwarded by Mr. Whitefoord, recommending a weekly mail service between No Town, and the Grey. This is a matter of the greatest importance to a populous district like that above referred to. At the Ahaura thiugs are looking pretty much the same. Favorable reports are to hand from several of the smaller places in the district. At Baxter's, several parties are reported to be doing well ; some are said to be making £8 per man per week, with a good spell of work before them. The store of Messrs. Cook and Owens is supplying thia part of the district with provisions. The population in this and the outlying places may be estimated at about sixty or seventy miners, most of whom are doing tolerably well. This part of the country is not thoroughly prospected yet, and the want of tracks to open up the country makes it a matter of great difficulty for any prospecting party to explore this part. Moonlight, April 30. In my last communication I mentioned a small rush which had set in to Jerry's Gully and the vicinity. It appeared that a party has been at work here for over three months, and had made first-rate wages during the greater part of the time. This party had the whole place to themselves as it were, and have been working on the quiet. The ground is very rich, but there ia a scarcity of water, and the party have had great difficulty in procuring a sufficient supply to enable them to wash up their stuff. It is the opinion of practical miners that this is a continuation, of the Moonlight lead, and if that is proved to be correct, the place is likely to become of importance. There are several parties ! busily engaged prospecting the terraces.

"With reference to the discovery at Jerry's Gully, although the prospects are very good, I would strongly advise parties at a distance not to come up here on that account, as the ground is only of limited extent and already taken up, and unless something turns up there is certainly not the slightest inducement to cause a rush of population to the locality.

The tender of Messrs. Winter &Busby of Westport, has been accepted by the District Engineer for the delivery of 4000 tons of stone (granite) in the Buller Eiver, at ss. lOd. per ton. Chinese Diggers. — Out of a mining population of 1500 on the Lawrence goldfield, Otago, 500 are Chinese; and out of 1343 miners in the Queenstown district, 635 are Chinese. The Union Bank of Australia shipped 1,810 ozs 19 dwts 12 grs of gold, and the Bank of New Zealand 2,464 ozs 12 dwts of gold per Murray for Greymouth. — Westport Times, May 7. Sale of a Tramway. —Messrs. Nancarrow, Henderson, & Co. sold by auction, at Marsden, the Rutherglen and New River Tramway, with the whole of the plant, carriages, horses, &c, for £3500. The purchasers were Messrs. Hartley Studdard & Co., of Rutherjden. The body of the miner Moorhead, who has been missing for about a fortnight, was found on the 2nd instant, in the Grey Eiver, a short distance below the coalpits. A man passing one of the shallow ledges saw the body, but contented himself with reporting the circumstance at Brunnerton. Mr. Drury, who was riding down from the Ahaura, was the next to pass, and he dismounted, waded across into the water, and brought the body ashore. A cheque for £100 and some silver were found in his pocket. The matter was duly reported to the police. The Grey River Argus states that the weather during the week has been bitterly cold, and snow is now lying thick upon the back ranges. From Napoleon Hill we hear that Monday night, May 2, until twelve o'clock, the wind blew a perfect hurricane. Tents, sign-boards, and everything moveable disappeared before it. It snowed heavily during the night, and continued until 10 o'clock next morning. A number of the inhabitants taking advantage of the opportunity, amused themselves by snow-balling each other, and they appeared to enjoy the fun immensely. The Maoris have given another proof of their possession of imitative faculties of a high order, as according to the correspondent of the Wanganui Chronicle, they have invented a kind of telegraph, of which he writes : —" I had occasion early this week, to go to Waihi, the post garrisoned by the natives of the Ngatiporu tribe, and was surprised, by one of them asking if I would like to see their " waea " (wire), or system of communicating from one whare to the other. Their post is divided into two distinct pas or redoubts. They asked me what I would like to say to a native in the other pa ; I gave them a message, and to my astonishment, one of them proceeded to strike a bit of string suspended from the roof of the whare, and in a short time my message was sent. I did not wait very long when the string beforementioned begnn to vibrate; one of them took a bit of paper and pencil and proceeded to take down the answer to my message, which, when translated to me, I found to be a correct one. On looking, I found that the string is stretched from one whare to the other all over the pa, aud that a continual communication is going on. I conversed with a native, at a distance of about 40 yards, for some time."

The Wairarapa Mercury gives the following extract from a dec d produced in the Native Land Court at Greytowo : — '•Now we have for certain given up and wept over, and bidden farewell to, and transferred this land, which has descended to us from our ancestors, with its streams, its rivers, its lakes, its water, its timber, its pastures, its minerals, its cliffs, its fertile spots, its barren places, with all above and all below the said land, ar.d with all appertaining to the said land, we have now entirely given up, under the shiniug sun of this day, as a lasting possession, to Victoria, the Queen of England." j Mr. Wylde has been inspecting the quartz reefs at the Lyell, and on his return to Westport furnished the following particulars to the Westport Times: — "The prospecting party, Antonio Zala and party, have struck two reel's of great thickness in driving through their tunnel. Gold is visible in every piece of stone tnken up, and also in the mullock which forms the casing of the reef. Until crushed, the amount per ton yielded of the precious metal cannot he specified, but the lowest estimate fixes it at riot less t! an 20oz to the ton. Several leaders cropping up on the surface of the claim are very rich. Specimens brought down. show gold throughout the gold and casing. The adjoining claims both to north and south have also struck gold ou the boundaries of the prospector's claim. The reefs or leaders are cut through by Zala's tunnel at from 200 to 300 feet below the surface, and being exposed on the surface, it proves equally rich there. Here is, of course, a very large quantity of stone proved to be payable in a high degree. We understand that arrangements have been made for the formation of a company for the purpose of procuring crushing machinery at once ; and that the necessary funds have already been obtained, pending the formation of the new company. A large amount of work has already been done by Zala and party, and they have undertaken to hand over one-half their interest in the claim to the company which will be formed at once. A Royal Pig Hunt. — The chief topic of the week is pig-sticking, with, of course, a prince of the blood royal for a hero. His Royal Highness has had his first spear, and it appears, from all accounts, none the worse for his acquaintance with the pigs — a fall or two notwithstanding. It was on the Bth and 10th of January, in the Moorshedabad district (where the Newab Nazim, now in England, comes from), that the pig-sticking came off. Ou the Bth, after breakfast, the party set but, with, among other impedimenta, no less than 28 elephants. His Royal Highness was mounted on an Arab. The first boar had almost attained the shelter of the trees when he received the first spear from Dr. A. Hill, and so well was it directed, that he rolled completely over. He was up again at once, and, shaking out the spear, made a charge at the nearest horse, when he was transfixed through and through by Colonel Probyn's long Bombay spear, three feet of which appeared on his other side. A few more well-directed spears finished his career. Soon after tiffin in a mongo tope, the line was again in motion, and before the evening, after more than one ran in the long grass, two more good boars fell, one to the spear of Major Trevor, and the third to that of his Royal Highness the Duke. The ground, though perfectly level, was somewhat treacherous, as the long grass concealed certain elevations and blind ditches, in which more than one rider came to grief. Several falls occurred — His Royal Highness had two — but no one was hurt, and the hunt went merrily on till the evening, when at the death of the last pig, a sad accident occurred which threw a cloud over all. This accident was the disabling of "a gallant little Arab" belonging to Lord Marcus Beresford, which had to be shot. We are further told that M. Chevalier, of the Galatea, " had a very narrow escape, having with a Gallic intrepidity bordering on rashness dismounted to try conclusions with a wounded pig. He was at one time in great peril, and only escaped a severe mauling by his extreme agility and the dexterous use of his lance." — Bombay Gazette. A young Tennessee girl recently married an entire stranger, alleging that she should have plenty of time to become acquainted with him afterwards.