THE THAMES GOLD FIELDS.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume 13, Issue 1064, 9 July 1869, Page 2

THE THAMES GOLD FIELDS.

(From the " New Zealand Herald.") .-..-: A cleaning up this morning of the recentcrushing of six days from the Long Driye of their middling stuff" gave 1,557 ounces of amalgam, and should give' over 500 ozs. . of gold. This must be another matter for congratulation to tho fortunate shareholders. There is about 100 tons more to go through, in addition.to the large, amount , of specimens taken out of this wonderful claim. This afternoon i oyer; one hundred weight of the richest specimens everjaken from this or any other claim were brought to light. I need not picture to your readers the excitement here upon every discovery, and the "Long Drive, 'as "Hunt's" of old, is a .bye-word in the mouths of all. Shares have recently changed hands at £120 per scrip, and I should not be surprised to hear that they had considerably increased.- To. use the words of a person who has seen this wonderful leader, "the whole, is a blaze of gold." The Wild Missouri claim, Tararui has had a clean up, the machinery being only delayed a short time ; 200 tons,have been crushed realising over 4 ounces oi retorted gold per ton.; owing to this satisfactory result, shares joining claims have changed hands freely. • : Some magnificent specimens have been - taken out of the well-known All Nations, • similar in character to the sister claim Long Drive — they are bulky and thickly ; impregnated with the precious . metal. Sixty tons of rich quartz is now^ Ibeinj"*; bagged for crushing at the Kuranui Co.'s battery, and, from pickings of the heap . and specimens, I have no hesitation in saying will result in over 1,000 ounces of gold. This claim is now being placed under the operations of the Companies' Act . — the shares being valued afc £6,000. „_ . There has been great activity during the week in dealing with share"! '; i and, 6& tho whole, these last few days has shown that every confidence is felt in the per« manency of this field. THE LONG DRIVE SPECIMENS. The total yield from the Long Drivespecimens amounted to 1,525 ounces 1 dwt. The amalgam which remained to be retorted afc the last report yielded 34ozs. 15 dwts., which in addition to the 1,490 ozs. Odwts. lodged in the Bank on Wednesday, makes the total amount we have just mentioned. The whole was melted yesterday afc the Bank of New Zealand by. Mr. Smith, and resulted in 1,471 ozs, 14 . dwts, of melted gold of a very superior description. THE DEEP LEAD CLAIM. '/ " *"' The usual fortnightly cleaning up of the crnshings for this claim yesterday re- " suited in 197 ounces of the retorted gold. It is expected when the; cleaning up is completed it will exceed 200 ounces. The yield this fortnight is not so great as the returns for some time" past have been, but this is not any way to be attributed to * falling off in the quality of the" reef, but to the fact that a lot of very inferior stuff was mixed with the quartz. We have :' boen informed by Mr. White 1 , the manager ofthe claim, thafc the, reef never looked better than it does at present. It has been followed in a winze to a depth of between 40 and 50 feet, and has increased , in size from 2£ to 5 feefc. Gold has been got all the wav down tho winze. At the next fortnightly crushing, stuff from the • reef will altogether occupy the machine. Arrangements are now being made for sinking a shaft 9 feet x |3£ to a depth of 280 feet for the purpose of facilitating the. working of this reef, and powerful pumping and winding gear will be erected upon the mine. The lode is nofc only getting larger in the lower workings, but " tho stone is getting richer, and it is expected that when opened at a good depth the yields will be greatly, increased. , ... :