NELSON.

New Zealand Spectator and Cook's Strait Guardian, Volume VIII, Issue 769, 15 December 1852, Page 3

NELSON.

The Weather and Crops. — The showery character of the season still continues. Scarcely a week has passed over since the commencement of Spring without giving us some copious showers of rain. The crop of hay will be exceedingly heavy, and. the mowers are already at work ia various places. AH kinds of grain promise a like abundant crop, and if we are blessed with good harvest weather, the rick yards cf the settlement will have a most satisfactory appearance about March next. Looking to the price of corn in the neighbouring colonies, and the prospects of harvest, the farmers of New Zealand have ample reasons for self-congratulation. — Examiner, November 27. Reaping Machine. — An American reaping machine, patented by Messes. Hussey and Co., which had been imported at Canterbury, has been brought up to this settlement, and purchased by Mr. Harkness. The machine is beautifully constructed, on a very simple principle, and as it is calculated to cut down twelve acres of wheat a day, it cannot fail, in the scarcity of labour here, to be of the utmost importance during the coming harvest. — Ibid. We are glad to be able to announce that operations are to be commenced immediately both in coal and copper mining in this settlement. Mr. Stoddart, a gentleman from Wellington, who was formerly a coal surveyor in Scotland, has been engaged to make a survey of the coal field at Pakawau, with a view to determine the spot most eligible for the Nelson Mining Company to commence its works, and is about to proceed at once to Pakawau for that purpose with the requisite assistants. We have learnt also that a contract has been entered into between the lessees of the copper mine at the Dun Mountain and Mr. Wrey, and that this gentleman, assisted by a practical miner and a competent engineer, has engaged to open the copper mine, lay out a road, and convey to Nelson a sufficient quantity of the ore to test the real value of the lode, so that, should the mine prove as rich as it promises to be from external appearance, means may be taken to raise the capital required to work it, which will then be done without difficulty. — Ibid, December 4.