THE KIMBERLEY GOLDFIELD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIII, Issue 7660, 10 June 1886, Page 5

THE KIMBERLEY GOLDFIELD.

THE KIMBERLEY GOLDFIELDS. Melbourne, June 9. The Argus this morning publishes a telegram from their Western Australian correspondent announcing that at present 70 men are employed at Kimberley, all surface workings, and they have all obtained more or less gold. AN AUCKLAND SYNDICATE, The barque Notero, which arrived yesterday from Lyttloton, ie, upon discharge of her inward cargo, to be placed on the berth for Kimberley. In respect to this matter, we learn that there is an endeavour to form a syndicate to send the vessel named to the new El Dorado. The company is to consist of 23 members, of £100 each, and the vessel is intended to be loaded with timber, meats, potatoes, etc., and upon arrival at either Derby or Cambridge Gulf, to there act as a storeship, and dispose of her cargo retail, in the sama manner as a store on shore. Captain Smith, the master of the vessel, is to have charge of the businese, and, to help him, he will have associated with him a supercargo. The barque is expected to sail about tho 23rd inst. TELEGRAM FROM PORT DARWIN. The following telegram has been received by tho Minister of Education for South Australia from the Government Resident at Port T)arwiu :—" At Bridge Creek about forty Europeans are all making wages, and four alluvial claims have paid a dividend to each shareholder of £12 per week. Other claims have done well, and one digger is reported to have 91b weight of gold in his hut. Chinese here also obtained good gold on the old Britannia. Chinese also atill working on Burgan's Creek, Fountain Head, Sand Creek, Houschildt'e Rush, but reliable information cannot be obtained, as they naver admit they are getting gold. Two tons stone from No. 3 North Union, crushed at Jansen's Pine Creek battery last week, yielded 370z, and good stone is being obtained on several claims, but the battery at the Union is practically useless. Fitzgerald'a claim, Pine Creek, gave last week 1370z for 4S tons stone ; Christmas claim gave last year 34Soz from 3S tons stone ; and Jansen expects prospects equally good for this year. Jansen has just struck on very rich leader, and has shown mo large specimens studded with gold. Mount Wells, with '2000 tons ore at grass, stuck up through breaking of a new-fangled pump. Imposition of poll-tax regarded by all as equivalent for optional labour." PROVISIONS DEAR AND SICKNESS PREVALENT.

It is stated by telegram from Perth, Western Australia, that 300 diggers are proceeding to Kimberley on Saturday, May 22, via Cambridge Gulf for best landing, aud as the route that way is the shortest to the gold fields, aud probably the best. The Government Rceidciut ie located at the foot of ibastion Hills, on the south-woat arm of the gulf. Two stores have been erected on View Hill, but provisions are exorbitantly dear. JNo horses arn procurable at tho gulf. At Derby Hour is IVhd per lb. A few horses are procurable there at £20 a piece. The accounts from the diggings are unreliable, as the diggors are very reticeDt. It is believed, however, that 20lXbz were brought into Derby, and one nugget of 20oz pure gold. Sickness is prevalent among the digger*. It is absolutely necessary that diggers should import sufficient horses for their equipment, and six months'provisions, otherwise disaster is certain. Cattle are being driven to the diggings fiom Roeburn. A resident of Fruemantle informs the Newcastle Chronicle that when he lefc Perth, on April 30, the price of Hmr on the Kimberley diggings was 4s per lb, and other stores were proportionately high. Horses could not be got for love or money. He is of opinion that the diggings will be a great success, and will prove a turning point in the development of Western Australia.

A RETURNED NEW ZRALANDER GIVES HIS EXPERIENCE. TO THE KDITOR. Sir,—Will you kindly publish the following for the information of your readers : — Having read a great deal that has been said in favour of Kimberley being a good climate, and one suitable for a white man to live and work in, I would like, with your kind permiision, to place before your readers a few facts respecting the climate ot that part of North-western Australia lying between Cambridge Gulf on the north and Derby on th<s south. 1 formed one of a company who were duped into going to a place named Camdon harbour, intending to form a settlement. Gamden harbour is about 150 miles south of Cambridge Gulf, We were induced to go there by reading the report which Sir George Grey gave of the country and climate, which report, allow me to say, differed as much from the real fact «f the place as the climate of New Zealand differs from that of the Soudan. I can safely affirm that, if there 13 a rush from New Zealand to Kimberley, very few indeed will return to their homes or families again. It is no climate lor c white man to work in. New Zealandere would die like sheep there. When 1 was there it was in December, and the heat was intense. The thermometer registered 140ileg. in the shade for six hour* each day. 1 saw strong Australians trying to work at getting their provisions and other goods carried a little above the reach of the tide, and failiug, because their strength succumbed to the heat. I saw a man die there each day of the week out of 130, and at the end of three months only 90 of the total remained. The bonee of the other 40 are there now. I have seen the grass grow there nine feet high in a few weeks, and sheep fed on it only weighed 161b, the quality of the teed was so poor. Ido not write thus to seek to terrify with what cannot be substantiated. There are othera in New Zoaland who were there at the same time as well as myself, and who bad not the means of getting away trom it at the time I came away, but stayed there until the Perth Government sent a steamer to bring the remainder away. These could tell you many sad tales of their hardships,—not hardships through want of provisions (because of that there was ample), bufi hardship brought about by thirst and heat.

I cannot say whether there are rich goldfields tfaere or not, or whether gold ie eaey to find or not, but this I can say, that for the working men of New Zealand Kimberley is no place, and you had better uUy here with only such prospects of making » rise as the goldfields of New Zealand offer you. Why risk your health and lives in a country where perhaps your chances of socuring wealth are quite as remote as they are here, and where for every ten of you who go and stay there for any length of time five will etay there until th« day of judgment, and one of the other five may return with plenty of the needful, but of the majority that will come back thoy will be but poor specimens of the healthy sons of New Zealand they once were. In conclusion, I would say, "Take the advice of sin Australian, and wait for tho country to be opened up before you go. There is plenty of time, if the field is only half as good as it is represented to be."—l am, &c, D. J. Frazbb. Te Aroha, June T, 1886.