HOW WE FIRST FOUND GOLD AT THE THAMES.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3547, 21 November 1882, Page 4

HOW WE FIRST FOUND GOLD AT THE THAMES.

(TeAroha Mail.)

There were eight in our party, and after having a good loot round the Shortland end of the gold field we determined upon selecting Tapu creek as the locality for our operations, five of our number pegging out a reefing claim on No. 2 creek, whilst three of lis took up an alluvial claim in Gully No 3. Nothing came of the reefing claim, but we soon found payable wash dirt in the creek, and at the end of the first day's sluicing we found the returns showed at the rate of £3 a-day. This was encouraging, and we ■worked with a will, tho gold beginning rapidly to accumulate. One evening, about a week after we had commenced operations, a miner came up from the adjoining claim to borrow a longhandled shovel. This, of course, we lent him, and after a short chat as to how his party were getting on, he returned to his work shovel in hand. A dog which belonged to one of our party, followed him, probably to see what could be picked up in the shape of eatables at the neighboring camp, returning shortly afterwords with a parcel in her mouth, which bore a strong resemblance to a man's dinner, wrapped up in a red handkerchief. One of our party noticing tho result of the dog's errand, remarked,' Fan has sprung a plant,' and we all laughed at the dog's smartness. Noticing, however, that the parcel, which the dog had commenced to untie, appeared to be remarkably heavy for bread and meat, the first speaker left the sluice box where he was to see what the dog really had found, and the next moment his exclamation, ' Boys, look here!' also called us to the spot. We found him with a sardine box full of bright, clear, nuggety gold, which had evidently been discovered by the dog in its hiding place, the smell of the box having led her to believe that she had come upon something of an edible nature. Of course, we returned the parcel to the owners, after having chaffed them ou the subject of some people having more gold than they could take care of, and then returned to work. Dinner having been duly discussed, we were quietly inhaling the fumes of the fragrant weed, when one of our party suddenly exclaimed, 'Boys, we must leave this, and find out where that gold came from.' We did not see the force of abandoning a claim which was yielding at the rate of £18 a week, but tbe first speaker, who knew thoroughly what he was about, pointed out to us that from the size and general appearance of the gold in the sardine tin he was convinced that it had been carried down into tbe creek from a reef afc no great distance from where they were sitting, and that we should have no difficulty in finding the spot. We yielded fo his arguments, and started afc once to prospect the neighboring spurs, and the same evening, just as the white mists were creeping along the gullies, whilst the wreaths of smoke which commenced to curl up from the camp-fires dotted through the hills, and the ' cooees' echoing afc intervals from the distant claims, reminded us that ifc was time fco abandon our efforts until the following day, we came upon the object of our quest. A rich ' mullocky leader,' cropping out on the crown of a spur about 300 yds from the creek, presented itself to our delighted eyes, and we felt that we had, indeed, struck the right thing at last. A claim was pegged oufc for the entire party, which gave the whole of us a very good rise, for, after obtaining a dividend of about £120 per man, we disposed of our shares afc prices ranging from £500 fco £800 each, all due honor being paid to ' Fan,' who had been the means of our making the fortunate discovery.