New Zealand Spectator, AND COOK’S STRAIT GUARDIAN. Wednesday, November 19, 1851.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VIII, Issue 657, 19 November 1851, Page 3

New Zealand Spectator, AND COOK’S STRAIT GUARDIAN. Wednesday, November 19, 1851.

The William Alfred sailed on Saturday for Sydney, filled with passeagers, the greater part of whom, we believe, intend going to the diggings, and several others we are informed contemplate following their example. We regret that any should be found to leave New Zealand, because we believe that to an industrious persevering man it offers the best prospects of any of the colonies in these seas; and we fear that those who leave the certain prospects offered to industry here for the uncertain chances of success attending the search for gold will have deep occasion for regret. It is one of those cases, however, that will hardly bear arguing, because those sanguine persons who feel unsettled in their minds and anxious to try their fortune will not listen to argument, but look only to the bright side of the question. They hear that some arc successful, and conclude if they were only to try their luck they would be successful also, they cannot bear to think of disappointment,' or failure, —this they leave to others—nothing will satisfy them but an actual trial, they will not be content unless they buy their experience for themselves. It may not be amiss, however, to remind them that of those who left New Zealand for California (a richer gold field than Sydney,) all who could were only too glad to find their way back again—sadder if not wiser men—and we doubt not the same result will occur in this instance also. That gold is to be found in New South Wales, and in considerable quantities, there can be no doubt; there can be no doubt also that of those now engaged in seeking for it a great proportion, after working hard, leave the diggings in disgust from want of success, and that the quantity of gold found does not yield more than a moderate average remuneration to the total number of gold diggers. The

greater the number employed in the pursuit the more the prospect of success is diminished, so that while we shall probably still continue to hear of a few individual instances of success, the failures will be still more numerous than they are at present, and will have the effect of operating as a wholesome antidote to those who may have the misfortune to be affected by the contagion of this "yellow fever.”