WELLINGTON.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 5, Issue 274, 26 December 1861, Page 3

WELLINGTON.

• (From our oion Correspondent.) 23rd Dec. 1861. The s. s. Storm Bird arrived this morn-ing,--via Lyttelton, with lots of returned diggers*:,to . eat;- their Christmas dinners with their friends here. She left Dunedin on Thursday afternoon at 4 o’clock ; up to that period the English mad had not arrived:.' It appears that Hooper, a little Nelson akipper, has regularly humbugged all newspapers; he had the audaqiuy to. tell Mr. McKenzie that he had seen an October Home A ews. You had therefore, better not extract the paragraphs I allud^to. Lots df; diggers had returned to Australia arid elsewhere, as they promised to join their friends at the end of the year, with tlie irit'ention of returning ; this will account for " the slight falling off in the yield of gold,' which was last weekly esoort (not fortnightly as before) a little over 14,000 ounces ; a good many diggers, however, had arrived lately at Otago. The. fine s.,s. Oscar, I regret to report, has :S behAwrecked at Invercargill through the carelessness of the pilot, McTaggart, a mart'who lias no experience of the place. He--&ks a hiate on board the Airedale when the 10,000/ gold robbery took place, and was arrested" on suspicion of being implicated. I consider the authorities at Dunedin I .are highly reprehensible in appointing such an incompetent man. There were at the time the steamer struck some 250,0 r 300 passengers, and 80,000 oz. of gold -in her; providentially all were saved. The steamer Oberon had been despatched to render :: assistance. Mr. Treweek’s cattle, by. the Lord. Worsley, arrived all safe ; horses have fallen much in price. It appears.a most fluctuating market, as instance potatoes, 16/to 18/; a lot are daily atpected from the Chatham islands which s will glut the market. There is little local" news. The dinner given to Mr. Kennedy, Inspector of the New Zealand Bank, came off with great eclat , and gave- gEe|#:satisfaction., . .They; are doing a large already at Otago, which .will be. greatly'augmented on the Ist. January, as-many-parties don’t .wish to change their then. The arrival of Sir George Gi*ey is anxiously looked for j lie .is fully expected in the first week in January. Mr. Fox is to accompany him. There ia now every probability that the next General Assembly will be held in-AYellington; I expect not. before April.

. OTAGO. *. The intelligence from. Dunedin is up to the 19th inst., by the Storm Bird, •which left on that day; • The weekly escort arrived on the 12th with 16,141 oz., and again on the 19th with 14,000 oz. ; 20,640 oz. being firomTuapeka, andthe rest from Waitahuna. Mr. Reyman, whahas been prospecting in the north of. the province/ has found" gold near the Dunstan mountains, but mot.as yet in paying quantities. He expects, however, to find a good lead. There is plenty of water, firewood, and'coal. • The Otago Daily Times of the 19th has the following “Great excitement was caused at Tuapeka by the arrival there on Tuesday inornihV of a man named O’Hara and his mates, with the report of a discqvery of a new gold field. They had with them 34 ounces of gold, which they sold to the Union Bank. It was of a coarse nugget fcy description, interspersed with quartz ana conglomerate. A prospecting claim was granted them. “ It was found on one of the tributaries of the Waipori, on. the West Taieri road, about eight miles north of the Waipori ferry. It was obtained by turning the bed of the river. The excitement at Tuapeka was immense. Nearly 2000 men were proposing to’ start yesterday morning, but the rain prevented them. Major Croker is going to visit the spot himself. It is about 27 miles from Tuapeka, and the same distance from Dunedin. “ Another rush had commenced at Melbourne for Otago, in consequence of the receipt of--40,000 ounces by the Aldihga;”'' The following extracts from a letter written by one of' our townsmen to his son gives a glimpse into the life of a digger which we have not had before. It is dated Tuapeka, Nov. 29 : “ Well, my boy, I must tell you what like the diggings are. First, there is a creek running down Gabriel’s gully about the size of the one out at Metarawa valley. The gully is about six or seven miles long, and about 100 yards broad in some places, and in others 300 or 400 yards. Then there are high hills on every side, about as high as that hill at the back of Green’s hotel; and the tents are stuck on each side of the -gully on the sides of the .hills. We can count 300 tents from our own tent door. Among these are twenty store? or shops. Some of them are as big as Rowell and Co.’s store ; the most of them are tents; but some have galvanized iron sides with canvas roofs. There are several public houses and eating houses, butchers’ shops, and bakers’ shops, all made of calico or canvas. Plenty of ginger beer and pies here. There is one very big house, iron sides and covered with canvas, about as big as Taylor and Watt’s large store. It is for the San Francisco Serenaders. They are black fellows that sing songs and cut all sorts of capers, arid they charge 5s a night to go to see them. I have not been, and do, not intend to go. The father of the boys T told you about in my last letter has got a pie. shop, and they go about and sell the pies, but they are not very good boys. There is, however, a fine boy staying in the next tent to us. He is a very Scotch boy. Ido not think lie _ tells any lies, and I like him for that. I have hud a wore r.ud have not' been able to take hold of anything with it, so this boy came and drove the pump nearly all. day yesterday for me, at least he helped me to drive, and I gave him a shilling and a pie,, and he was very much f pleased. He thinks lie will make his lot before he leaves the diggings. We gave him some stuff to wash to-day, but lie said there was very little in it—-just two or three ‘midges’ een ’ in a tin dish full of stuff; but he has got about 3 dwt. of gold and 3s of money, so he is well pleased. There has been a great rush from here to the Blue mountains or some place, nobody knows where ; about 10.00 men left here last •week, and none of them knew where the rush was. F. W. has come in since I began to write this ; he has been away for eight days seeking the new'rush, but. they have not found it; hundreds more the same .vay. It is now getting very late, but I hear a man crying on the other - side of the gully “ Dunedin Daily Times,” giving an account of the new rush and a great murder. I would go' and buy one, but it is too dark to cross the gully. We had the coldest day on Saturday, 16th November, that we have had since we have been here. It came on to snow at dinner time, and all the hills were white. We rolled a great big snow-ball at our .tent door, but it was all away before night. It was so cold that I had on two pairs of drawers, two pairs of socks, a blue shirt, and a monkey jacket, and after all, as I was not able to -work with my' sore hand, I was obliged to go to bed to keep myself warm. I must finish now as I am very tired, sitting, on a pillow' and writing on a box lid.” (