THE KIMBERLEY GOLDFIELDS

Press, Volume XLIII, Issue 6491, 13 July 1886, Page 3

THE KIMBERLEY GOLDFIELDS

FTJRT-CKR DISCOUBAGING

BEPORTS. [VBO— OO- CO—BSSFONDSNT ._ _Bt TS—BO—S.PH FBO— THB BLUFF.] MELBOURNE, July 5. Somewhat discouraging news continues to arrive with regard to the Kimberley go—_eld— A Port Darwin telegram states that the steam launch Victoria retnrned from Victoria river on Friday evening, bringing Messrs Biddies and McMillan, who have just returned from the Kimberley go—(fields, where they have worked with indifferent success for six months. They reached the Kimberley gold-elds on the 7th December, and started prospecting at Palls Creek, where they worked four dayb for small returns. After covering a large tract of country they decided to relinquish work till the wet season sets in. The water is scs> r ' , e. They only made bare wages. The color could be found everywhere, but the heavy gold was in a patch much water worn, and the best is found in narrow ravines. They left the Black Elvire on the 4th May. At that time about sixty men were employed on the fields, bnt most of then? had gone to Derby or Cambridge Gulf for provisions. They state there is little use in diggers going till after the wet season, and—icy should be well provided with horses. The Derby correspondent of the " Argus," writing on June 7th, cays:—» The men who have come down from the fields profess to be by no means sanguine of i*s turning out good payable alluvial country. I Bay "profess to be," for of course it is to their own interest to discourage a large influx before they have time to gobackthem-a-lvea and fill their pockets a second time. "Where p—ties have come down with 250z, 603Z, 80oz. 12(fcz, 160.>z, and 230._ or even more, and not a single party without some gold, it would seem that there meet be some alluvial working to be found. On one point, and that a most import—it one, all the miners are agreed, and that is that this will give a magnificent reefing field. All the indications are very rich.