JOTTINGS FROM CLYDE.

Cromwell Argus, Volume I, Issue 7, 22 December 1869, Page 5

JOTTINGS FROM CLYDE.

Your correspondent of last week has j unfortunately (or, as some persons think, ! fortunately) taken advantage of the friendly f&jjfbv of the Refractory Ward at the D.D.H., but during a passing moment of i consciousness, he sent for me and begged " an I loved him," to send you all the news of the week. Firstly, the vreather has been intensely hot for the la-st five days, Wednesday and Thnrsday being so sultry that everyone anticipated a shock of an earthquake, but fortunately none occurred, and the heat still continues. .The excitement in regard to your reefs appears to be gradually subsiding, but I hear that some of our townspeople have determined to give Bendigo a few months' ■further trial, and are consequently going , to keep on the men at present employed there. From the Serpentine, the latest news is that Mumford and party have succeeded in baling out their shaft, and have obtained, first rate prospects. Some company is, I hear, about to make application to the Warden for the monopoly of the watercourses, but it will be strenuously opposed by the quartz companies, as, in the event of the grant being made, machinery could not be got to work without the aid of steam. At Conroy's, Iverson and Co. have sunk through their leader, but are about to commence another shaft, where I trust they may have better luck. The prospects ' at Butcher's still continue good, and the people of Alexandra have determined to thoroughly prospect the hills in the neighbourhood of the Manorburn, gold-bearing quartz having been discovered in that locality. A few words about a matter which deeply concerns the welfare of the district and the community at large—l allude to I the power possessed by the publicans. It j is not as a teetotaller I write, but as. one 1 who wishes to see everyone prosper, to see i * miners able to return in a few years to the " old country" with a sufficiency to maintain them in comfort for the rest of their days, to see the various branches of trade better supported, and not to see men who have toiled and slaved for eight or ten mojtiths come into a township and, instead of banking a portiou of their earnings and • spending a few pounds in getting necesj sines and comforts for their tents or houses, I ' gointo a public house or shanty, with say j i £IOO, and are kept in a state of drunken- ► ness-till the landlord chooses to turn him out and return Kim a five-pound note to get i back with In a certain class of public houses, this is constantly done all over the Look at Clyde. We have nine licensed houses, and yet ( what a thirsty lot we must be !) we also have two shanties, at which thori is no attempt to disguise, but Tom, Jack, or Harry can go and pay their money and get their drinks. The male population here is considerably L under 100, including the Camp and others who are not householders, which gives one hotel or shanty to every nine persons. / Why, two would be amply sufficient; but 1 if eleven can make it pay, somebody must provide the money. How much poverty might be traced to this source! See: there's a man in business who will spend alf-a-crown or five shillings two or three nights in the week, "just to give so and-so a turn" ; andyet you ask that man for a subscription to some charity and he says, " You seem to think a man's made of money ; why don't you go and ask the publicans, or some one who can afford it ?" In conclusion, I would notice that, acpfri cording to the Treasurer's Monthly Report in the Diislan Times, the balance to the credit of the Dunstan District Hospital is gradually becoming " smaller, and beautifully less." Query : Who is to blame 1 Everyone knows that a mining community has only to be asked, and that the , money is always forthcoming for such an object, and I cannot but think that if the collector only stirred himself a little he might have a different statement to shew <.,aX the end of the year. ,