GREY VALLEY GOLD-FIELDS.

Grey River Argus, Volume XIV, Issue 1700, 15 January 1874, Page 2

GREY VALLEY GOLD-FIELDS.

[prom our own correspondent.] .*& MINING, : '* The resumption of work after the holi» days has now become genera], in the mining districts, but, contrary to expect tation,. nothing new has resulted from the interchange of . information which usually takes place among the miners during the great annual vacation, The very best; account is one coming from the Browne's Terrace lead at Noble's. Although there has not been any new, discovery there, the ground opened is paying very well, and the lead is extending. A number of new leases and extended claims were applied for at the last sitting of the War- ' den's Court, showing that, the desire to enter into undertakings more or less permanent is spreading. Of the new appli? cations foj? extended ground the gr.eates.fe number, .of course, come from Half; Ounce, a .district which is becoming re? markable,; and, takes the lead for enterprise and energy in the prosecution of its mining. operations. Hafford and party applied for a new leasehold at the lower end of Hifford's Terrace; An extended area was granted to Jacques and party at Noble's. New areas were applied for at Browne's Terrace arid Mosquito, and two new leases" were applied for at Try- Again Terrace, Nelson Creek. It was expected these latter would i be objected to, not because they, were objectionable, in.themselves, but because a somewhat foggy and confused notion has got abroad that the introduction of the leasing principle will be bad ior the district. So it will as the district has been for the last twq or> three years, for it will disturb the "rest and bethankful" dreamers and galvanise, life into them. A rattling of the dry bones is already begun and an earthquake is. threatened, if the innovation is persisted in, but for all this the alteration is an accomplished fact, and cannot now be disregarded. A new and more enterprising system of working must be adopted and put into use, for the plan hitherto pursued by the Van Winkles, who lay a sort of prescriptive and traditional claim, ■, based upon remote and undisturbed occufe* pation, to all the good things lying abouf?fe has been tried long enough. • TflSr" obstinate, but very amiable, old " Rips," who cling with the tenacity of alStardshell conservatives to, the fond Ksolle.c--tion qf a former state of existence, should remember that the times have change^ and are changing, and that people o.f progress suit themselves and their ideas to times as they go along. The soundest advice that can be given the persons who go in for indiscriminate opposition to the granting of extended claims is to secure extensions for themselves before it be too „ late, for they may rely upon it opposition L will be done away with when an increase*^ of population takes place. The applica-f r tion of Hicks and party, for five acres at% Try-Again is recommended, and that 6f^ Kerr and party, for a similar area at the ' same place, was postponed, because thai requisite particulars for the information^ of the Warden was not forthcoming;' During the hearing of a case of disputed ownership of a claim at Owen's Look-out, it transpired that the ground in that%>- , locality is exceptionally rich. There \a , still a chance, it is said, that the RUttep* may be traced' to an extension popsider-v ably beyond the boundaries of the prospector's' claim. From the No Town district the principal item is the continued influx of Chinese £ miners to the place. They, are literally pouring in in droves, arid the Chinese population cannot now be less than; 300. According to the latest advices a vessel was to clear out at D.unedin torday with 2QQ Chinese on board for the West Coast and the majority of them are consigned to the Grey Valley. The bed of jNo Town from the junction of Abe's Gully to below Lally's Half-way is now occupied exclusively by Chinese. Below Lally's they are making preparations to . bottom a paddock in the creek bed, and if they can succeed in striking anything they will cause quite a revolution in th« place, for - as the ground is entirely untried in the £ vicinity a large rssh may be anticipated. JB Chinese scouts have already visited the Upper Gcey.districts in Bearch of suitable places to plant .Bettiementa of - their *

countrymen. One of thece Celestial pioneers fell into the hands of the Philistines at Ahaura, and he doesn't think much of Philistines ever siuce. There is an almoßt unlimited and a. practically inexhaustible field for the peculiar operations of the Chinese in the beaches and bars of the Grey River from the junction of the Arnold upwards. The European miners of the Grey Valley have most unaccountably almost totally neglected this description of mining, although it is that from time to time individual proBpectora have proved that there is any quantity of ground to be. forked, allalong the river at both sides that with constant work would pay from 40a to 60s per week at the least. If the Ohinamen once get settled at this kind of work the yield of gold will increase rapidly, they would swarm around it in such numbera.