COOK'S STRAIT MINING COMPANY.

Nelson Examiner and New Zealand Chronicle, Volume XIV, Issue 69, 24 November 1855, Page 2

COOK'S STRAIT MINING COMPANY.

A meeting of persons interested in the Cook's Strait Mining Company was held in the Court House, on Thursday last, the 22nd instant, for the purpose of learning from the trustees the steps which were proposed to be taken for surrendering the company's interest in the Dun Mountain Copper Mines to the parties in England who have offered to work the same. Mr. C. Elliott was requested to take the chair.

Mr. Travers, after stating briefly the steps taken by the projectors to form the Cook's Strait Mining Company, read to the meeting the agreement which Mr. Wrey had entered into in England with a body of gentlemen whom he had induced to undertake to work the mine, and who engaged to guarantee to the original contributors the same privileges which they would have been entitled to in the Cook's Strait Mining Company, had that company been formed. These gentlemen had since become the purchasers of the freehold of the mine, subject, it was true, to the lease of twenty-one years which the Government had promised the Cook's Strait Mining Company. Mr. Travers then produced and read a power-of-attorney, from the committee of the Cook's Strait Mining Company, surrendering their interest in the mines to the gentlemen in London above referred to.

Proposed by Mr. Riding?, seconded by Mr. Collins, and carried —

That this meeting approves of the steps proposed to bo taken by the projectors and trustees for the company, for ceding and conveying the interests of the company in tho Dun Mountain Copper Mines to the gentlemen in England, parties to the agreement of the Ist January, 1855.

Several questions were afterwards put to Mr. Travers by Mr. Stafford, Mr. Sewell, and other contributors, as to the position of the contributors who might decline to join in the power-of-attorney which had been read. Mr. Traveus stated, that the act of signing the powcr-of-attorney would be a proof of their being shareholders in the new company about to be formed for working the mines, for the number of shares to which it would be stated they were entitled. By the original prospectus, it was left optional to contributors to become shareholders or not, as they might afterwards think proper, and to sign the powei'-of-attorney would be a declaration that they had determined on becoming shareholders in right of their contributions. Other questions were put to Mr. Travers, as to the individual liability of the shareholders in the new company, to which it was replied that no precise information could be given, but there was no doubt but that the gentlemen who were getting up the company in England would form it on the plan of limited liabilities of shareholders, if practicable, and that such, in fact, was their intention.

Mr. "Wuey, in reply to inquiries as to what was doing at the mines, stated that since the arrival of miners and labourers from England the character of the lode had been tested in various ways. The lode now working was eight feet wide, and the ore exceedingly rich. Several tons were on the bank, but until a road was opened to the mines the ore could not be removed for shipment. A long succession of unfavourable weather had much retarded the road work, but what had been done showed clearly that no practical difficulties existed to getting a good road to the mines in a very short time.

Some further statements were made of a similar encouraging character.