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Westport Times, Volume II, Issue 266, 8 June 1868, Page 2

The Auckland gold fields appear to be increasing in extent and importance. The quartz reefs in the Thames district | are proving exceedingly rich, and it is no w author itatively announced that alluvial workings have been discovered. Mr Commissioner Mackay has lately addressed a report to the Superintendent of Auckland, in which he states that on the 13th ult he proceeded up the Haratunga. The first three miles was over a flat block of ground, very suitable for a township—thei eastern side having been leased by Mr Smart, while the western side has been reserved for cultivation. The main creek is fed by five rivers of some size, and by some others of minor importance. On four of the streams, two on the east, and two on the west, alluvial gold has been found by Mr M'Leod while another party of prospectors have found it in another creek. He (Mr Mackay) is of opinion that gold exists in payable quantities, and there will be work for at least three or four hundred men in creek and bank mining. Mr M'Leod handed to him four or five ounces of gold, some of which was very ' much water-worn, and three or four other samples of quartz containing gold worth from £2 15s to £3 10s per ounce. No gold has as yet been found in any reef, excepting the one found by the natives. The upper part of the river is described as similar to Oollingwood on the West Coast, and in this judgmont he was borne out by miners from that district. The Eo.cky Eiver diggings was a payable one, and there the gold was found in patches, as has been the case at Kennedy's Bay as far as they have prospected it as yet. Under the circumstances Mr Mackay considered himself justified in granting additional claims to the discoverer of the field. There were, when the Tauranga left, upwards of one hundred men at work on the ground. The Southern Cross publishes the following as the latest news from the goldfields: —" The news brought by the steamer Tauranga which arrived from Kennedy Bay last night is simply corroborative of that we published on Saturday. We learn that between 300 or 400 people were on the ground, and that the number is rapidly increasing, bojbh by means of land and water, Good gold is being got from all the creeks ; but it appears that no one has as yet attempted reefing. A fortnight's protection has been granted to claimholders. In consequence of the high prices charged for meat by the butchers of Greymouth, a public combination, counter to the butchers' league, has taken place. In the Grey River Argus, of Saturday, an advertisement appears, in which tenders are called for the supply of meat for three months, signed by twenty-six residents, who bind themselves to deal with the lowest tenderer, the meat to be of the best quality. Amongst these we find Mr Kevell, the resident Magistrate, the Police Camp, the Greymouth Mess Club, lawyers, doctors, drapers, publicans, and tradesmen of all kinds.

We would remind the Provisional Hospital Committee, that the question as to the allotment of the £ISOO voted to the G-reymouth Hospital, under circumstances to which we have recently referred, may yet be gone into; at least enquiry may be made as to whether the grant is to irrevocable, for if not there can be no doubt it can be better applied, and it is at least possible that if proper representations were made, the authorities might be induced to reconsider the desirability of so disposing of that amount of money,

Judge Clarke arrived yesterday in the Bruce, and the District Court will therefore certainly open this day at 11 o'clock. As we have previously stated, the business, excepting the insolvency cases, is light. Amongst other arrivals yesterday was Mr Rees, the well-known Hokitika barrister, who has come up to attend the Court.

"Wo take the following from the Greg River Argus : —■" Mr Gilles, of the firm of Carey and Gilles, of Hokitika, who has just returned from Queensland, in the firm's steamer Star of the South, gives a very deplorable account of the condition of the miners there. The alluvial diggings in the Maryborough district are almost completely worked out, and thousauds of men are rushing about the couutry from place to place wherever the rumor of gold is heard. The quartz reefs are idle, there being no machinery for crushing, and no probability of there being any for some considerable time. At the time the Star of the South left a rush had set in to the Cape River diggings, to the north of Cleveland Bay, and thousands of men were flocking thither) The accounts from that place were not very favorable as regards the diggings, and the extreme unhealthiness of the climate and eearcity of water had produced a fearful amount of mortality amongst the miners, upwards of seventy out of some five or six hundred having died from fever and ague, or sunstroke. Mr Gillies states that all the West Coabt hands are anxious to get back, but they have not the means. The Star of the South could have been crammed with return passengers if she would have taken them at the rate offered. A good many are knocking about Sydney and other parts of New South Wales.