OUR MINES.

Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4393, 1 February 1883, Page 2

OUR MINES.

QUEEN OF BEAUTY. A late report from the mnnager says: — Yesterday morning, while catting out for & set of timber in the south-west corner of the shaft, quarts was out, and it is now in about 6 feet into the pump end, and about 3 feet at the winding end. The quarts is about 12 inches thick, is heavily charged with pyrites, and is lying on a soft bed of pipe-clay, with an underlie of Ito I^. I consider it to be a dropper off the reef. It is making very little water. V DART. The manager at present is sinking the main shaft by wages men, the tenders submitted being considered too high. The country is a good class of sandstone, though pretty tight, which makes progress slow. The men are now, down 14 feet below No. 2 level. The water issuing from No. 1 reef is caught in a crosscut formerly driven from the bottom of the wellfhole, about seven feet. 4 below No. 2 ffatsheet, so that there^is very little ; water in the bottom of the shaft. This dam is emptied twice each shift by means of a pipe. Both water and dirt is wound to the surface in large buckets instead of the ordinary cages. By this means the mullock is lifted straight from the bottom without any intermediate handling. The water dammed back in the No. 2 crosscut has risen to the level of the creek, and is now soaking back through the country.

SEYMOUR. Good progress is being made with the erectionof poppet legs, winding machinery, &o. One pair of the legs is ready, and Mr ELneebone expects to have both pairs in position by the end of the week. A portion of the excavation for the site of the winding engine and boiler has been done, 'and as soon as the poppet legs are out of the way the boiler will be taken from Price Bros.', where it is being repaired, and conveyed to its new sphere of useful" ness: No work can be done in the shaft till the machinery is up. GOLD RETURNS. West Coast. —Jones and party have finished a crushing of 4 loads of dirt for he return of 14ozs retorted gold.