The Gold Fever in South Africa.

Te Aroha News, Volume IV, Issue 178, 13 November 1886, Page 3

The Gold Fever in South Africa.

The gold fev6V that has laid hoH upon South Africa threatens to rival in its heat and intensity the earlier days of the Australian and California goldfielde. Every mail brings the nesvs of free.h '' rushes " In addition to the established fields of the Transvaal, gold appears to have been found at Witwaterarand and in the Heidelberg and Waterburg districts of that Republic. Discoveries are also reported in the reserve territory of Zululand near the Natai border, in distant Amafiwfiziland (a native State east of Transvaal now being slowly "eaten up ' by the Boers), in the Kuysna district of the Cape colony, and oven in the Orange Free State. Such alluiing miners' names as "Queen of Sheba Reefs," "The Wheel of Fortune," and others, are upon the tongue 3 of every one, and speculation grows rampant. It is to be said, to the credit of South African newspapers, that they are warning their neighbours to exercise caution It is pointed out that of the 6,000 people now at the Transvaal goldfield*, only a small proportion are earning wages and many will die of starvation on tho road It is characteristic of South Afric.m cold that it is usually found in quartz reefs, and powerful crushing: machiuery is therefore demanded for its extraction The new fields consequently are not likely to affoid great facilities to the small digger who wocks his own claim- — " St James's Gazette."