TE AROHA.

Thames Star, Volume XII, Issue 3834, 12 April 1881, Page 2

TE AROHA.

(fbom oue own cobbespondent.)

Yesterday.

In the Aroha, or Prospectors', the manager is sending down stone, and in all probability will be the first to crush. The work of sending stoDe to the mill is rather costly and tedious, owing to the want of a road up the gully leading to this part of the field. The Prince of Wales shareholders are busy making a shoot, so that they may send a trial crushing as soou as possible, and should their stone prove payable, they have any amount of it; but the general opinion up here is that very little care has been taken in getting out stone, the owners trying to get out as large a lot as possible, without regard to value. The vVaihou started work again last Friday, their protection having expired. The All .Nations are now in with their main drive 340 feet, and have cut several leaders, some of which the manager considers payable, and a crosscut has been put in over 90 feet. Thus it will be seen that the owners of this mine have not been idle. The Don is in 140 feet, and are still in a hard country, and progress is I slow. The Shotover drive is in 65 feet, and the leader gives good prospects as it is driven on, but the country is rather hard, ihe No. 1 South still keep on some hands,, but the shareholders in this company are rather long-winded in paying calls, and from what I can hear I believe the directors intend making them pay up. In the Waiheke a large amount of work re being done, and the shareholders deserve success, but they are badly in want of a experienced manager, as the shareholders are mostly strangers to the work. Iv the Inverness prospecting is still going on. The Comet shareholders are working on the leader, and the prospects met with seem to satisfy the owners of the mine, who for the most part are strangers to this kind of work. In the Smile of Fortune, the manager cut the reef on the surface a few days since oa which the rise was being put up. He has driven to the boundary of the Morning Star, where he has started to sink, and expects to hole through in a few days. This will thoroughly ventilate the mine, and give a chance to open out. The small leader still continues about the same size (eighteen inches), and the prospects continue good. The general opinion here is thai the stone is good for a payable , return. This evidently is the opinion of the owners as they are laying down a tramway in conjunction with the Morning Star, and have also agreed to put on six men to make the road i.o the battery.

In the Caledonian, some prospecting is going on. The Bee Hive shareholders seem to be all drones, as they are doing very little work. The Clunes and several other claims have again been taken up in this locality, and some of the knowing ones went and pegged off the Morning Star on the morning of the Bfch, but they only had their work for their trouble, the claim being a licensed holding was not to be had for the pegging. The Piako County Council, when the field was opened, we were told, were going to be a model body, and what they were going to do to help the miners in opening up the country. They would have no interference from the Thames! I think it is a pity that they did not to some extent follow the example of that body, and lend a helping hand to the district, as up to the present they . have done nothing except a bit of work on the main road, and rithough there is not a mine in the district connected by any sort of a road, although offers have been made to do half the work, and the amount of money paid to the Piako Council is about £350. Up to ths present not one half of that amount, has been spent, aud so far as I can ascertain no attempt has been made to get a portion of the £10,000 vote for tracts on goldfields, but the excuse is they are new H the work ; I don't think they will ever be anything else. Many of the miners complain of the treatment this place is receiving, and think that they would be much better off if they were a portion of the Thames County, as then some attempt would be made to open up roads to the mines.

A lumour has been going about here that Grant and Foster do not intend to carry out their arrangements with the Government in reference to their land purchase, and that Vesey Stewart has taken over the whole affair.'