GABRIELS BEEF.

Tuapeka Times, Volume III, Issue 210, 8 February 1872, Page 5

GABRIELS BEEF.

The anticipations that the above reef, when struck from the 30ft- shaft, would be exceedingly wide, have been realised. Messrs. Mark have during the last week been cutting into the reef, but when our reporter visited the ground they had not got through it. The body of the reef is considerably harder and more compact than it is at the higher levels. Picks are found quite- useless in penetrating it, and blasting has to be resorted to. It is estimated that the reef will be seven feet thick at the least. No fresh trials of stone of any consequence have been made, since our last issue. We understand that next week several tons of the quartz will be sent to the O.P.Q. battery, Wai- 1 pori, to be crushed and tested. Messrs. Clayton and Co., No. 1 claim, have the last week accepted a tender for sinking a 50ft. shaft. The men employed are . vigorously carrying o\it their contract, and no great time will elapse before they get down the required depth. It ie not expected that the reef will be found in the shaft, and accordingly driving will have to be resorted to. Messrs. Anderson and Co. have been granted permission by the Corporation to prospect on the Reservoir Hill. This party seem sanguine of striking the Gabriels line of reef, and intend to put men on immediately, A prospecting claim on a reef, the existence of which has been known for soveral years, was last week pegged off by Mears and party. This reef is situated about half a mile to the east of the prospectors' claim on Gabriels Reef. It runs east and west, or at right angles to the Gabriels Reef. Quartz was found cropping out at the surface, and on an open cut of two ,fe >t in depth being made, the reef was fonud 2ft. 6in, wide, and clearly defined. Several prospects have been tried with uniform success.