ANOTHER STATE INDUSTRY. Prospecting for Gold.

Free Lance, Volume V, Issue 247, 25 March 1905, Page 6

ANOTHER STATE INDUSTRY. Prospecting for Gold.

KING Dick must surely have been m a jocular mood when he addressed the Waihi miners last week. He was very much astonished, so runs the report, to find, on looking up the figures, w hat a paltiy amount had been spent ujjon prospecting as compared with what he himself used to expend as Minister for Mines Economy was a good thing, but he did not believe m parsimony This is really very funny, if the Piemier was correctly reported Although the parsimony is imputed in the next phrase to Parliament, it would be easy for an Opposition critic to make it appear the Premier was charging his colleague with starving the mining industry That, of coursb, could not be the Premier's intention His thoroughgoing loyalty to his coadjutors precludes the idea Besides, who but himself has the principal hand in serving out the loaves and fishes 1 But. he is fond of a sly joke, and away m the far South Mr McGowan appears to have put that interpretation upon it He gave Richard a Roland for his Oliver bv telling a Lawrence mining deputation that he was not prepared to take upon himself the burden of the Premiei s speech at Waihi Probably, the Hon. James has his own notions about his chief's astonishment in looking up the figures about expenditure on prospecting But. they might be sure, he went on to say, that he would not be slow to take the hint that more attention must be paid to mining And much more attention is going to De paid to mining King Dick has made up his mmd about it, and has already formulated his plans

on that head. Henceforth the State will do the chief part of the fossicking for gold In fact, Dr Bell, the new geologist ironi Canada, has already received his instructions. Belts of country known to be auriferous are to be thoroughly explored by four qualified men. It necessary shafts will be sunk, tunnels driven, and boring operations undertaken at the expense of the State to prove the field. From this it is but a step, and a small one at that, to State gold mines. *■ * * If the State is going to all the expense of sinking shafts and driving tunnels to discover gold leefs, there seems no earthly reason why, after locating the reef and proving it payable, it should not secure for the public the fruits of the outlay by running a gO'.u mine of its own The chances are, however, that the Premier isn t prepai ed to proceed quite so far just yet The finding of gold m a district is a wonderful stimulus to all sorts of industrial activity and to .-ie general prosperity of the colony That is where the State will reap its reward for the money expended UDon systematic prospecting of metalliferous country. + ■•■ + Population will be attracted from outside, capital will flow in for investment, local industries will receive a great impetus and commerce will expand There is no surer tonic foi languishing trade o>r a stagnant maiket than the discovery of gold neai at hand. So far only the surface has been tickled in New Zealand savins, perhaps, the great Waihi mine itself But, in a colony so rich m mineral deposits there may be many Waihis. The trouble is to locate them. King Dick is going to bring science to bear for that purpose If he can discover a few goldfields in this country everything m the garden will be lovelier than ever