QUEENSLAND GOLDFIELDS.

Westport Times, Volume II, Issue 176, 22 February 1868, Page 2

QUEENSLAND GOLDFIELDS.

The following letter from Mr White, agent of the P.N.Z. and A.R.M. Co., at Hokitika, appeared in the TV. C. Ti r.es relative to the telegram published ia our issue of yesterday : To the Editor of the West Coast Times Sir, —It will not be denied that the Queensland Groldfields are just now occupying more of public attention than any other subject whatever. In fact, they constitute almost the sole theme of men's discourse. The West Coast is said to be threatened with depopulation, and men who have staked their interests on its stability, find it difficult to conceal their uneasiness. Yesterday when the news spread of an eighty w five pounds weight nugget having been found, it was a study to observe the elongated countenances of not a few of our leading citizens. It was as though a thunder-bolt had fallen amongst tham. The town generally was in a state of great excitement, and I, as the source from which the news came, became unwittingly the focus of attraction—certainly not of admiration. Many things, equally harsh and stupid, were said to me about endeavoring to decoy the population from these shores, and getting up a " steamboat rush!" In fact, had I been a fiend sent as a scourge to the inhabitants of Westland. I could scarcely have been

more roughly accosted. Without hesitation, I confess that I am much fascinated by a steamboat travelling community, and any power or blandishment that I can conscientiously exercise to foster this mode of travelling, I always have exercised, and always will, while I continue to follow my present business. This, however, is a very different thing to the heartless proceeding of decoying men to forsake their homes and make long journeys by spreading unfounded reports. Now with regard to the latest news of the Maryborough G-oldfields, published in connection with my name, any one may see the telegrams by calling at my office, I do not vouchsafe for their truthfulness, but 1 have no reason to doubt them. I had but one reason for publishing them, and that was to check exaggeration. On receiving my telegrama I mentioned their substance to one or two friends, and I found that within half an hour the eightyfive pound weight nugget had increa e 1 to the formidable proportion of five ■hundredpound weig'it. Had not the Evening Star fortunately published an extra at noon that day, which enables me promptly to stop the growth of that nugget, I doubt that before night it would have weighed a ton. This brings me to the very pith of my letter. There is a pardonable selfishness practised by most colonial newspapers, however, defeats its •own object. I refer to the suppression of news that may operate to cause the population to leave, and the publication —in an exaggerated form—of such news as may seem calculated to deter it from leaving. For a specimen of the latter, I refer your readers to your contemporary's description of Queensland in to-night's issue. It wa* observed to me this evening that the effect of writing in newspapers upon " rushes" is always in an inverse ration to that desired. If this be true, which, I believe, the Evening Star will have a great deal to answer for in depopulating Westland. And yet the writer's intention was •evidently to frighten people from going I>o Queensland. From observation, I am certain that at the present time there is no subject about which the public is «o anxious as that of the 'Queensland G-oldfields. While this continues to be tbo case, I think it will be sound policy on the part of the newspaper press to publish every reliable scrap of information that comes to hand, without being too sensitive as to the effect it may produce upon Westland. For my own part, despite present appearances, I am sanguine that there is greater prosperity in store for Westland than she has yet attained.

Tours, &c, John White. Hokitika, Feb. 19. 1868.

The following is the article from the Hokitika Evening Star referred to by Mr White:— _ _ \ From the intelligence which has reached us through the telegraph wires and which more than confirms the various newspaper reports which had previously reached us, we have little doubt but that there will be an exodus from these shores in the direction of Queensland. Any advice that we or our contemporaries may have to offer we know will be, as it ever has been, totally disregarded. The gold fever can only be temporarily treated by a change of location. We know something of the West Coast of New ' Zealand with its genial climate, and its wide areas of auriferous ground. We also know something of the country in which the goldfields of Queensland i* said to exist. And we venture to affirm that out of every fifty men who proceed to those diggings ten will die miserably within twelve months of their first touching the shores of the

Wide Bay district. The Maryborough diggings are situated in about twentyfive degrees of South Latitude. It is intensely hot and arid during the Bummer months ; during the winter quarter there is nothing but a succession of tropical downpours, when the atmosphere is extremely humid with the wind blowing from the interor it is impregnated with death - destroying vapors which are brought from the marshlands which abound a little in from the sea-board. In summer men are carried off with dreadful suddenness by fevers ; in winter they Buffer the agonies of cramp and agues. The portion of Queensland to which we are referring swarms with insect life, which has the effect of depriving human existence of any pleasurable sensations-, the filthieHt of creeping animals are here found ; also the most venomous of snakes and the most stunted of vegetation. It is a climate where men may live if dwelling under shelter of structures sufficiently solid to afford protection from the almost vertical rays of a tropical sun, and where they are not called upon to per form heavy labor ; where they also live

exceedingly temperate both as regards eating and drinking ; where they are properly clothed and kept from exposure to deadly night dewß. It is only under such conditions that a people can retain health or hope for life. To S? to this part of Queensland, as diggers will go, with only canvas and calico tents to live under, and with all old habits firmly rooted in them—so unsuited for existence in a tropical climate—men will die in herds. We hope it will not be supposed that we write from any other motive than that of placing our readers in possession of facts which dare not be contradicted by anyone who knows the part of the country about which we have been writing. We are quite certain that those who leave the West Coast for Queensland will almost before they land on its shores have wished they had given this notice a more careful o onsideration.