A CRUISE IN A CATAMARAN.

Press, Volume XLVI, Issue 7350, 1 July 1889, Page 6

A CRUISE IN A CATAMARAN.

I By TSk Warrigal]. I sailed out of the Tamafei one fine morning before a light breeze and ebbing tide» and steered northwards into the Hauraki Gulf until Koreho Island stood on the weather beam. Then the wind dropped suddenly and the Laone lay becalmed on a glassy sea, helpless against dangerous currents and hidden rocke, and exposed to any northerly wind or sea that might sweep in between Tapu Island and Waiheke. Suddenly, and without warn, ing, the still water was heaved into a high regular swell. The Laone was lifted lik e a feather, high In the air, shaken until she creaked in all her joints and then carried irresistibly shoreward. Every swell that rolled in from the ocean swept *er nearer to the shore, and still no wind came to fill her sails and give her strength to escapeI put out the oars and rowed, but oars eeemed of little use against the swell and the tide. A lou« tongue of land juts out from the eastern bank of the Tamaki and the Laone was being slowly carried behind it. This tongue of laud stood between mc and the only haven I could reach, for the Laone could not beat up to Waiheke Island or make for the Wairoa River. A north-ease breeze followed the swell, and it came only just in time. By cracking on all sail and steering carefully I managed to work the boat to the north-west, and clearing a point of rocks by only a few yards I saUed into the Tamaki again. I cruised in the Laoue about the Tamaki for three days, theu the wind shifted to the south-west, so I made another dash out on to the Hauraki Gulf, and cruised along the shore until I entered the Frith of Thames. The south-west wind still holding I sailed with it to the south-oast corner of the Frith, entered the "Waihou river, and drifted up with the tide to a snug little bight in the eastern bank about five miles from the sea. Here I made the Laone fast in the shelter of a grove of willows, and felt pleased to think that she had accomplished such a voyage in safety. I had intended to voyage up the Waihou as far as the boat would go, but the prevailing winds blow down the river and a voyage against wind and current would not be repaid by what I should see on the river banks, so I left the catamaran and proceeded to the Thames. The Thames i s the common name given to the townships of Shortland and Grahamstown, it is the Government name of the river Waihou, and the generally received name of a large gold-mining district, east of Auckland. Shortiand and Grahamstown form the largest goldmining township in New Zealand and the most important one. It is a long straggling collection of houses lying at the base of a range of hills on a narrow atrip of flat land which fringes the Frith o£ Thames. It is the capital of the Hauraki goldfleld and a most commonplace looking town. The Hauraki goldfleld covers the whole of the Coromandel Peninsu'a from Cape Colville to Mt. Te Aroha. Gold was discovered here almost as soon as in Australia, for in October 18»2 the brothers Rinec found . the preciou 8 metal at Coromandel and announced their discovery to Governor Wynyard, who proclaimed the place a gold field. About 3000 men were attracted to the field but they soon deserted it. Two causes prevented its development, the hostility of the natives and the fact that the miners searched more for alluvial gold than for auriferous quartz. For nine years the mineral riches of theCoromandel peninsula lay undisturbed, and the miners trooped off to overrun the South Island and join the grand army of diggers who unearthed the golden riches of Westland, Colling, wood, and Otago. In 1883 the peninsula was entirely deserted, The Waikato war had broken out and the tribes Ngatimaru, Ngatitamatera, Ngatipaoa and Ngatiwbanaunga, who boasted that the head piece of their canoe was Moehau and its stern piece Te Aroha, meaning that their possessions ranged from the northern cape of the peninsula to its base, commenced hostilities against the pakehas and drove all the miners from their territories. These natives were receiving extravagant royalties from the miners, but they sacrificed these benefits either through their hatred to the pakehas or to their friendship with the Ngatimaniopotoe of the Waikato with which tribes Te Waharoa, their greatest chief, had years before made a treaty. It was not until the Waikato war was over that any white people dared to the peninsula. Then Mr James Mackay wa3 sent by the Government to accept the surrender and arms of the Thames natives. Whilst on this mission Mr Mackay learned that some rich specimens of golden quartz had been found by the natives in a kumcra plantation, and was shown pieces of gold brought by thq tribes of Olnnemuri. In 1867 the Government made some arrangement with the native owners of the soil, and a party of prospectors sailed from Auckland to the peninsula, and within a month the sur - prisine riches of theThames goldfield were made known. Thousands of men flocked o the peninsula, and every day some digger or other unearthed a fortuneHunt pegged out the famous Shotover claim, from which he and his three mates cleared nearly £200,000. Then the Caledonia, The Long Drive, The Manukau, The Golden Crown, and other mines dazzled men with their riches. The Caledonian mine paid its owners £500,00° in its first year. The Moanataiari claim yielded 14,t>00 ounces of gold in two weeks. The Golden Crown gave its owners fortunes. The Manukau held literally a reef of gold. In less than twenty years the barren peninsula has yielded nearly six million pounds worth of gold, and will continue to yield gold for generations yet to come. It is only quite recently that the natives have allowed miners to enter all parts of their territory. For years Ohinemuri was supposed to hold Eldorado, and the miners clamoured for admittance to the forbidden ground, but the Maoris guarded it jealously until the year 1875, when the district was thrown open and rushed; but no astounding finds were made. Then Te Aroha and Waiorongomai were declared open to the miner, and now all the Hauraki or Coromandel peninsula, a vast metalliferous district, is open to the prospector, and offers areas yet untouched by the miner's pick, and depths that may hold golden reefs. If any writer wishes to gather material for a romance on New Zealand quartz mining, he must go to the Thames. No other place offers such a history of surprising finds and rich pockets. Sometimes, after months of barren work, a stroke of the pick revealed golden veins, where masses of rich yellow metal lay encased between sandstone walls. Sometimes a company spent a fortune iv developing their claim and stopped work when within a few feet of their reward. Sometimes a chanc e drive in an abandoned mine struck vain* able pockets of gold. Although the history of raining at the Thames shows the most erratic and fickle occurrence of both reefs and gold, yet the miners assert that there are laws which govern the occurrence of gold. They say that a reef may pass through several classes of rock: that is through various strata of tufaceous sandstone, and in that stratum, which is hard, light-coloured, and dense, the reef may be and generally is auriferous, whilst the'same reef either at a higher or lower level passing through unfavourable strata carries no gold. Thisfact suggests that the rock through which the reef passes governs the occurrence of gold, a fact. I believe, generally acknowledged. Hochstetter, one of the greatest ceologUts who has visited New Zealand, if of opinion that the gold of the Hauraki pen* insula is derived from the paleozoic clay slate formation which underlies the trachyte, tuff, and conglomerate covering the hill ranges of the peninsula: a:id this opinion, though made before tunnels and ' drives had shown much of the country.

has been jnstifled by experience. So far auriferous quartz reefs have only been worked in these tufaceoue rocks overlying the main body of clay slates, but many learned men besides Hochstetter are of opinion that when the clay slates are reached the true and more extensive auriferous country of the peninsula will be found. It may seem absurd for a passing observer to offer any opinion as to the geology of the Thames gold field and to differ from the general opinion, but I trust ray remarks will be received indulgently. According to the various geological reports the tufaceous rocks of the Hauraki are supposed to be of igneous origin and to have been deposited on the main rocks as a flood of molten matter which has in the course of time cooled and solidified—that in the creeks and crevices of these rocks quartz reefs have been formed and have derived their minerals from the strata they occupy. Now I have 8 different theory. We will suppose that at one time the Hauraki peninsula consisted of hill ranges of slate rock intersected with quartz reefs or more probably only intersected by cracks and crevices through which steam and boiling water issued. i The power which had lif ced up the slate rock, made the«e cracks and fissures, and supplied the boiling water and steam is still alive when over the land there falls one of those vast showers of volcanic mud, such as fell lately at Tarawera, and such as have fallen at various periods over the North Island. Shower after shower falls on the Hauraki peninsula, burying the slate rocks under hundreds of feet of matter. The showers may have fallen at different intervals and the matter may have differed slightly in composition. The steam from the old fissures and perhaps the boiling water forces its way through the new deposit and naturally finds the cracks aiid crevices made by the process of drying or by the further upheaval of the slate rock oed. In the process of time the volcanic deposit hardens into rock, the steam and hot water,bearing silica and minerals from the slate country beneath, deposit, quartz slowly but surely, until the crevices are tilled with what we call reefs. During this times the hydrothermal action was growing weaker be. cause the rocks beneath were growing cooler, and now the only signs of this hydro-thermal power are found in the south of the peninsula and at Te Aroha in the same class of country, where the hot water and steam can be seen even now building quartz on the walls of the crevices through which it finds its way. This theory may not be correct, but it is practicable and at least suggests the idea as to how the quartz got into rocks of volcanic formation. Whether the theory is wrong or not it does not detract from the more geueral idea that the present gold-bearing rocks of the Hauraki peninsula rest upon rocks of clay slate formation, from which they may have derived their gold, and which are at least far more likely to prove auriferous than the newer deposits at present worked. This only suggests that there is golden treasure yet to be won at a depth not any greater than the mine shafts in Australiabut still twice the depth that has yet been reached at the Thames.