New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) MONDAY, JULY 30, 1877.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 5101, 30 July 1877, Page 2

New Zealand Times. (PUBLISHED DAILY.) MONDAY, JULY 30, 1877 .

What was it Dr. Johnson said in the preface to the work by which he is best remembered —his wonderful compilation, the Dictionary. It has so long since given place to enlarged and improved editions, that we have not been able to find an original copy for reference ; but it was something like this:—“l have not been able to define with absolute accuracy that which has always been indefinite ; but I have endeavored to trace and collate with clearness, from the best authorities, using sometimes my own judgment, in framing a new rule.” This may not be the exact rendering, but it is the impression left on our mind by an early and—it must be admitted—enforced reading of the teadrinking and not over amiable old lexicographer. In some such terms, it seems to ns, the Hon. Donaid Reid might have addressed the House when replying to the puny criticism elicited by his painstaking effort in the direction of consolidation and simplification of the complex and often contradictory mass of law relating to goldmining with which the statute books are burdened. He might very well have added that the Government did not look upon the Bill as one affording scope for party warfare, but simply as an effort to attain the standard of uniformity of which a good example is to be found inter alia in the Bating Act of last session. For the moat part he can only fairly claim the merit of a careful collator; but here and there he has introduced provisions such as considerable experience or close observation of the working of the mining laws could have suggested. Of these the one first to attract notice is that relating to the issue of “ miner’s rights.” The wonder is that such a convenient mode of overcoming what has been often a source of annoyance, and sometimes loss, to those engaged in mining, has not been previously adopted. To many a digger working in one of those out-of-the-way places that attract the moat venturous of the errant spirits who do the “prospecting” that generally enriches others more than themselves, the periodical visit to the warden’s office for the talismanio “right” to a “claim,” is not seldom a vexatious task, to be delayed as long as possible. It means generally an otherwise needless visit to the “ township,” the concomitants of which it is not particularly necessary to describe. By the new method this can be avoided for a term, if desired, fully equal to the average duration of the best so-called average claims. Then, again, in the case of associated mining enterprise, the “consolidated miners’ right” will prove a boon of great value, although, as it seems to us, somewhat liable to abuse. To explain this objection, it is necessary to mention that by the new method a company may take out a “right” for, say the ten, twenty, or thirty men it may bo intended to employ, instead of as formerly requiring each man to be personally the holder of one. This, it is evident at once, places the company out

of the power of malicious combination or reckless neglect; but, on the other hand, it seems to us a rather one-sided arrangement. It is possible that in glancing over the Bill we may have missed the clause; but if there is not, there certainly should be one, providing for forfeiture of a claim in the event of work being suspended for more than a stated period, unless on sufficient cause shown to the warden, whom it might be well to have assisted in such cases, by say a “ jury of four.” The next novel provision—well, the term is the first that occurred to us, but it really expresses more than our meaning requires—is that “the Governor” is made from beginning to end of the Bill the referee in almost every imaginable case outside the actual jurisdiction of the Warden’s Courts. In this —bearing in mind that Superintendents are memories of the past—there is not anything so shocking or utterly centralistic as at first sight has appeared to some of the objectors to the Bill, notably to Mr. Oswald Curtis, the hon. member for Nelson City, who the other night felt it his duty to point out that various powers hitherto exercised by those officers—no, we forget, by the Waste Lands Board—although what were they in many cases but the nominees of the Superintendents, had been vested in the Governor. At the present time they are a relic of provincialism, awaiting reformation, and we are also entitled to suppose that the Waste Lands Bill, for which, by the way, the country is waiting with impatience, will be so much the less cumbrous by the absence of the clauses relating to goldfields manage-

ment, which would otherwise have been an essential feature. The constitution of Mining Boards, it may be as well to add, is provided for, but on conditions that will prevent the smaller mining communities 'from availing themselves of the privilege—that is to say, on the petition of 500 persons. This, however, is of course a matter that may be dealt with in committee. The ticklish question of mining on private property has been, perhaps judiciously, avoided, although it is one that will sooner or later have to be dealt with. The salient features of the Bill are now sketched, somewhat imperfectly it is true, but with sufficient distinctness to enable those who are not inclined to read through its 189 clauses and voluminous schedules to understand its provisions. Seeing that, as stated above, it is a combination of some fourteen Acts, besides embracing several of the provisions formerly included in the Waste Land laws of the provinces, it could not well have been expected to be less bulky. The reference of the Bill to the Goldfields Committee is not in our opinion likely to be productive of very desirable results, for the simple reason that the ideas of members are likely - to be biassed by local considerations to an extent almost certain to interfere with their judgment as regards broad principles. This is, by the way, only fair; for if the Government are firm they will have no difficulty in carrying a measure which, whatever its defects, is at all events an improvement on the present chaotic mass of well-meant but perplexing laws.