REPORTED KEEP AT THE CASCADES.

Westport Times, Volume VI, Issue 1033, 27 December 1872, Page 2

REPORTED KEEP AT THE CASCADES.

(To the Editor of the Weslport Times.) fci»"> —Relying on the correctness of the rumour concerning the reef reported te» have been discovered at the Cascades—from which place I have just returned— I venture to offer you the result of our experience, as it may be the means of preventing others from travelling on a fruitless errand. We made up a party of five, and reached the Cascades about five on Friday evening, and on Saturday morning at daylight we started on the search. lA>r about the first mile the travelling w r as tolerably easy, and we soon fell hfwith recent tiacks, and about one and a half or two miles up -we found the reef, Which proves to he the same one that was prospected four years ago, and there has not been two days work ddue on it since, and we failed to discover the slightes traces of gold in it which of course very much disgusted us, but as we had come so far we determined not to go back until we had made a search for ourselves. We divided into parties, one going up one branch and the other going up tne other branch. After crossing a very rough slate country with very little wash and no sign of gold, we came to the first outcrop of the sandstone, in one part of which, where a slip had occurred, a fine lot of loose hard coal was seen, and in sufficient quantity to guarantee the existence t>f some large seams in the immediate neighborhood. But as coal was not our object we left it. On our return we found the camping place of the so-called prospectors, and no less than a score of empty gin bottles. [Now, I cannot think any storekeeper would be so confiding as to let them have grog in that quantity for prospecting. We came to the conclusion that instead of prospecting for quartz reefs their real object lay in looking out for waifs and trays from the boats, for we saw no place where a day's work had been done. I don't think golden quartz will be found there without much patient search and labor, but if the recent report should prove the means of drawing attention to the coal seams, our self-styled prospectorswill, unwittingly, have rendered a service to the country.—l am, etc., J. B. B.