THE PALMER.

Grey River Argus, Volume XV, Issue 1899, 7 September 1874, Page 2

THE PALMER.

A NEW RUSH. J. [CORRESPONDENT OF COOKTOWN HEKALT), AUGUST I.] News of the rush which has taken almost the entire mining population^ of this gold-field — the reefers excepted-^to a net-work of tributaries to: this river, far away from this Lower Camp, :;ha». of course reached Cooktowr* long before this, and has been communicated 'by "the diggers themselves to their friends all over the. Colonies. T am not given to exaggeration, and when L. state that almost every miner I have conversed with says he believes more^ gold has been got by the 2500 men working. within a radius of 20 miles on the rush, thau.ever was goton any gold-field ever, opened by \the same number- of men in a few weeksi'iVls necessary to state also a very serious set off in the extremely high price to be paid for everything, that claims are worked out in no time ; that a digger ia nowhere on the rush without horses; that horses

s>re constantly dying from the bad quality of the feed ; and that they are not to be replaced except by paying—metaphorically — their weight in gold. To my own knowledge lOoz were refused the other day for a scrubber not worth LlO, except under extraordinary circumstances. The diggings are situated on a large sandy creek that falls into the river about .20 miles above this township — and its tributaries. The commencement of the diggings is atDufFs Camp, about 25 miles from the Upper Commissioner's Camp, 50 miles from this Lower Camp, and probably 30 miles above where Sandy Creek junctions with the river. The prolific tributaries have been, and still are, Oakey Creek, Pine Creek, and Jessop's. Mr Collinson, a digger from the rush, who has just left me (and who, by-the-bye, has a ravine all to himself and his mates, on the quiet, with which he is well satisfied), states that when he visited Oakey Creek, two or three weeks ago, it was taken up for ten miles, and that for seven miles not 10ft of ground could be got. Then there are M'Leod's Creek, and others, and a number of ravines. The characteristics of all the country constituting the new rush are about the same. There is no sinking ; the pick, shovel, dish, and cradle doing the whole of the work. It appears, however, that in Oakey Creek the gold extends far into the bank in many places which have been tried. In a former report I mentioned that the original prospectors, Messrs Mulligan and party, had been prospecting on the Mitchell falls, and that if they had not at that time been rewarded with success, they at ar>y rate had no doubt of eventually opening a gold-field in that direction. I know of one party getting " good gold " — to use the common phrase — on the Mitchell Watershed at the present moment, and there may be several others. The belief of a great many of \he more intelligent of the miners with whom I have conversed is, that the present rush will carry those who follow it right on to the Tate before it ends ; and the impression on all sides appears to be that the future permanent emporium for those widely-spread goldfields will be somewhere about the head of the Mitchell. From the manner in which parties of men have lately gone great distances ahead of all others, and opened fresh payable ground, there can be no doubt of the permancy of this goldfield, or series of gold-fields ; and as it appears that carriers are already going a begging for freight to the Palmer at Cooktown, and the diggings must necessarily be wofully shcrt of provisions during the many miserable months constituting the wet season, it would, it is the universal opinion here, pay a capitalist, or a body ef capitalists, magnificently to despatch ten or twelve waggon loads of goods to somewhere in the direction indicated before the wet season commences — and there is no time to be lost.