"WEALTH FOR HONEST LABOR."

Colonist, Volume II, Issue 115, 26 November 1858, Page 3

"WEALTH FOR HONEST LABOR."

(From the Wellington Independent, Noverttber 10.) Tub extraordinary rush which recently took place from Melbourne and Sydney, to the newly discovered gold-fields at Port Curtis, seems perfectly unaccountable to the generality of persons in Now Zealand. To most of us the eoinparisen which has been made of it to ft stampede upon the plains of South Ameri-*; appears peculiarly applicable. "A fewr animals become excited and start off at full speed. They waken up their brethren of the plains. They gather as they go. Scores become hundreds; hundreds—thousands, aud tens of thousands. All rash forward, shaking the«arth and producing by concussion a sound as of many waters, until they reach a precipice over which they dash with impetuous blindness until the chasm is filled up with one vast moving and dying mass. Were enquiry made as to how all this originated* it would 'be found perhaps in some trifling «ause, which generated a false Impression in some harum-scarum four-footed tenant of the prairie." On what slender information this stampede of gold diggers took place, we have already informed our readers. Qf the ten thousand who flocked from the old established fields, scarcely any had aught but the vaguest impression of the nature of the country to which they were going, or of the actual productiveness of the Fitwoy. In vain did the press point out, day after day, the necessity for .more reliable testimony being received, before men of ordinary foresight and prudenceyshould venture thither. Tlie receipt of some three or four hundred ounces at Sydney and one-half that Quantity at Melbourne, acted like wildfire; destroyed the good effects the press was beginning to produce; decided the waverers ; confirmed the more determined; and hurried several thousands to the scene of action, notwithstanding that during that very week the returns, from the Victorian gold-fields alone, amounted to fifty-five thousand eight hundred and twenty-two ounces—a clear proof that the home fields were still as productive as ever, that somebody was getting gold in Victoria, and that it was not total failure or labor in vain in iheir own mining districts. Before we can. in any way understand how masses of the people can thus be moved from such gold countries as Victoria more especially, we must divest ourselves ofthe notion that gold digging is tiie high road to wealth. We are so accustomed to take our cue from the accounts of monster nuggets and other lucky findings which are constant.y startling us, that a large portion of the community is apt to fall into the error of supposing that gold digging is infinitely more lucrative than mere mechanical employment. Than this, nothing can be more fallacious, as statistics of undoubted authenticity have repeatedly proved. We remember when two years since, the proposition for putting an export duty on gold was before the Victorian parliament, tlie legislature entertained the prevalent 'idea,' and "were only undeceived by the carefully compiled statistics then laid before them. The number of persons actually engaged in mining or rushing about in search of new diggings, was ascertained to be, in round numbers, about one hundred thousand . the yield of gold was'estimated at the value of twelve and a half millions sterling, for the year; thus shewing the average earnings of each person t© he not more than eight shillings a day, less than the wages of a day laborer in any ofthe neighbouring colonies, including New Zealand, when the cost of living is taken Into account. Whilst, therefore, a comparatively few persons are realising fortunes, the great majority of diggers are barely earning a livelihood—for them there is no wealth for honest labor. Mechanics aud laborers, in all parts of New Zealand, have thus reason to consider their labor highly remunerated when compared with that of gold digging. . In this individually unremunerative character of the old established gold-fields, is probably to be found the secret of the recent exodus to the Fitzroy. Good must, however, eventually come out of evil, for as fresh findings in this neighbourhood will in all probability take place, a busy settled population will ere long be established, andanothev step in the colonization of the Australian continent effected.

While we regret the rashness, we cannot but admire tlie spirit of enterprise with which the Australians are endowed. If a little of this enterprising spirit were indoctrinated into us, it would do us no harm. With so many sources of wealth requiring to be developed, it is surprising that so little attention is given to them, and only to be accounted for in the fact of the present capital of the province being otherwise profitably employed. Those of our readers whose thoughts are sometimes turned towards .the golden advantages of other colonies/forgetting the flax, coal, copper, iron, and we know hot what other undeveloped resources thafc exist in New Zealand, will read with advantage tlie following parable ?— " Once upon a time there was an old chap that had heard or read about treasures being found in odd places, a pot full of guineas or something; and it took root in his heart, till nothing would serve him but he must find a pot of guineas too; he used to poke about all the old ruins, grubbing away, and would have taken up. the floor of the church—but the churchwardens would not hare it; One morning he comes down and says, 'It is all right old woman, I've found the treasure/ — ' No! have yon though ?' says she. ' Yes,!' says he ; ' leastways, it is as good as found"; it is only waiting till I've had my breakfast, and then I'll go out and fetch it in.—' La John, but how did; you find it ?' ' It; was revealed to me in a dream/ says he as grave as a judge.—'And where is it?' asks the old woman. ' Under a tree in our own orchard—no further,' says he.—' Oh, John, how long you are at breakfast to-day!' Up they both got and into the orchard. ' Now which tree is it under?' John, he scratches his head, 'Blest if I know.'— 'Why, you old ninny/ _ays the mistress,'didn't you take the trouble to notice?' 'That I did,' said he; * I saw plain enough which tree it was in my dream, but now they muddle it all, there aro so many of 'em.'—'Drat your stupid old head,' says she, 'why didn't yon put a nick on the right one at the time?' 'Well/ says he, 'I must dig till I find the right one.' Tlie wife, she loses heart at this; for there were 80 apple-trees and a score of cherry-trees. ' Mind you don't cut the roots/ says she, and she heaves a sigh. John, he gives them bad language, root and branch. 'What signifies, cut or not cut; the old faggots—they don't bear me a bushel of fruit the whole lot. They used to bear three sacks a-piece in father's time. Drat 'em.'—' Well, John,' says the old wowoman, smoothing him down,' father used to give them a good deal of attention.' 'Taint that! 'taint that!' says he, quick and spiteful like; ' they have got old like ourselves, and fit for firewood.' Out pickaxe and spade, and digs three foot deep round one, and finding nothing but mould, goes at another, making n little mound all

round him too—hut no guinea-pot. Well, the' village let him dig' three or -four quiet enough ; but after that curiosity was awakened, and while John was digging, and that was all day, there was mostly seven or .eight watching through the fence, and passing their jests. After a bit a fashion came.up of flinging a stone or two at John ; then John be brought out his gun loaded with dust shot along with his pick and spade, and the first stone that came he fired sharp in that direction, and then loaded again. So they took'that hint, and John dug on in peace—till about the fourth Sunday—and then the parson had a slap at him in Church! ' Folks were not to heap up *t0 themselves treasure on earth' was all his discourse.

"But this was only heaping mould. So it seemed when ho had dug the five score holes, for no pot of gold came to light. Then the neighbors called the orchard 'Jacob's Folly;" his name was Jaoobs—J ohn Jacobs. * Now then, wife,' says he, * suppose you and I look for another village to live in, for their gibe* are more thau I can bear.' Old woman begins to cry. 'Been here so longbrought me home here, John —when we were first married, John—-and I was a comely lass, and you the smartest young mau I ever saw, to my fancy any wayj couldn't sleep or eat my victuals in any house but this:'—' Oh I couldn't ye t Well, then, we must stay ; perhaps it will blow over.' 'Like everything else, John; but dear John, do ye fill lathe holes, tho young folks come far and wide on Sundays to see thorn.' 'Wife, I havu't the heart/ says he. 'You see, when L was digging for the treasure, I was always going to find it, that kept my heart up y but take out shovel and fiU thorn ia—l'd as leave dine oIF white of egg on * Sunday/ So for six blessed months the heaps were out in tlie heat «nd the frost, till the end of February, and then when the weather broke the old man takes heart and fills them in, aud the village Boon forgot ' Jacob's Folly/ for it was out of sight. Comes April, and out burst the trees. * Wtfe/ says he» 'our bloom-is richer than 1 have known it this many a year j it is richer than our neighbor.'.* Bloom dies, and out come a million little green things quite hard. "Michaelmas-day the old trees were staggering, and the branches down to the ground with the crop j thirty shillings on every tree «ne with another; and so on for the next year, and the next; sometimes more,.sometimes less, according to the year. Trees were old and wanted a change. His letting in the air to them, and turning tlie subsoil up to the frost and sun, had renewed their youth. So by that he learned that tillage is the way to get treasure from the earth."