COROMANDEL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume I, Issue 85, 20 February 1864, Page 4

COROMANDEL.

Modest worth will always in the main meet with its reward, and ensure attention. Quietly and unostentatiously, within tho last throe weeks, another attempt has been made to open Coromandel, and with most marked success. The results of the last fortnight have satisfactorily demonstrated its value as a gold field. The Driving Creek lias passed from the hands of schemers, fancy managers, and share brokers, into those of plain, practical men, who have set about the working of their mines in a quiet., plodding, but methodical manner; and the day will, wo trust, be far distant when there will be a recurrence to the feverish and excited state of things which ruled at Coromandel during the summer of 1803; when shavemaking and share-selling, not digging gold, was the order of the day; and when Auckland shareholders, rashly entering on tho formation of companies, entrusted the management and expenditure of large funds to the irresponsible control of incompetent and, in some instances, dishonest managers. Early this week we announced the fact that, by the ' Alice, tne manager of Iso. 5 Company, Captain Kiunis, had sent up 148 ounces of cleaned gold, taken from 132 lbs. of stone, and that by the next boat he would have some additional 300 ounccs to forward. So success-

fill, however, lias been the crushing, that instead of 300 ounces, as predicted, no less than 515 ounces of cleaned gold, the result of a crushing from No. 5, was -brought up yesterday morning, in the ' "Wanderer,' by Mr. Cook, the manager of Mr. Stone's erusliiug machine, which was employed on that occasion. This, with the gold sent up by the 'Alice,' makes altogether 653 ounces taken from No. 5 claim, tho produce of six days' work ; and we are moreover that the workmen are still employed in getting out stone of the same character. The 51-5 ozs. were lodged in the Union lianlc. "We have no further account of the workings in No. 4 claim (Kelly's), but may look for important results when the crushing takes place next week, as it is estimated that the result will be some 1200 ounces. The Albion, too, will soon be at work; and if amalgamation can be arranged boi;we;'ii the White Swan and No. li, and No. 1 J unction claims, the whole might be worked to oqn.il advantage, provided of course that a skill'id trustworthy manager could be found. The truth is. the sooner tho claims ou the Driving Creek can steadily settle into working order, the better. We are of opinion that this must take place step by step, and that it is better that it should do so in this way than by any feverish rush, in which cunning adventurers arc sure to profit at tho expense; of capitalists. As one claim establishes a reputation the adjoining one will be- taken into work again, and fairly developed, and so on; and the result obtained in this way will be more beneficial and lasting, both to Coromandel and the Province, than the recurrence of the scene of feverish excitement and wild speculation which characterised the proceedings of the previous summer. The claims have very properly been registered until the state ol' the country is more settled, and labour more available ; and rightly so, for it is just the power which the jumping system gave to the labourer over his employer that ruined Coromandel last year —compelling proprietors to expend a certain amoui,t daily in iabour, whether tho works could he carried oil profitably or not.

At a juncture, like the present, when imports of bread stalls and horse corn are necessarily of the heaviest ; r.uul when famine is the false alarm that is industriously sought, to lie sounded by those Avho Mould fain avert all other immigration than that of the -10 acre class from our shores ; it behoves those in authority to ascertain whether there is, or is not, a considerable quantity of corn growing upon land under military occupation which might not yet be harvested either as food for man or forage for cattle. It is said that grain, more than fit for the sickle, isprofitlessly shedding in several places : neither natives nor Europeans attempting to gather it in. That this is the case with the many corn fields within right of the camp at Tauranga, we ourselves have had occular demonstration. And we have it from perfectly reliable information that the same state of affairs is to be found in the rich corn 'country of Flat island. Koiv why should this be so P Tf the country has been occupied in consequence of the rebellion, the natives, naturallv, may be afraid to secure the harvest; hut why should we Why should the fruits of the earth, for which we toil ho hard, be permit ted to perish ? Possibly it may now be too late to husband those crops for the use of man, but even supposing the grain to be partially or largely shed, the straw might still be got in to serve as winter fodder and litter for the horses and bullocks which it is to be supposed ""ill ere -long be employed in the construction of the roads throughout the forest ranges. To confiscate the land and to suffer its produce to run to waste appears to be strangely inconsistent. The expedition to Tauranga was ft masterly movement. The rebels were taken before they were prepared to offer resistance. They are brooding over their disaster —meditating the possibility of a surprise—and exhibiting every possible token of ill will—carrying their audacity to such a pitch as to warn the Commandant, not to permit the boats oJ'the Miranda to proceed with harbour soundings otherwise they would be fired upon ! Upon what principle of false delicacy—or to speak more properly of infatuation—ought the crops of such enemies to be lost to the use of our roops P Is the Native Office, with its omnipotent authority, Dr. Shorthunl —an importation of yesterday, by the way—too powerful for the good of the service and the prosperity of the colony? The interventions of that gentleman have become innumerable and intolerable. He is New Zealand's " Old Mail of the Sea," and he rides her colonists with an unrelaxing grasp. Who or what is he that he should exercise suc-h mastery P Are there no means of shaking him from oil'the colonial shoulder P But even supposing that there should exist such an incredible myth as a friendly native in Tauranga, would it not be better for that friend's sake to save as much of the corn as we possibly could P If it be suffered to go entirely to loss—one of two things must inevitably follow —either our friendly natives will be apt to starve, or they must purchase their food from our imported rations. Yiew the question as one may, it is one deserving the immediate attention of the Government. If it be too late to save, the grain, it is not yet too late to secure the straw. The troops are comparatively unemployed. A week's work would be most profitably expended: and at Flat Island large stores of wheat and straw woidd in all probability be obtained.