LETTER FROM BROKEN HILL.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 9130, 11 August 1888, Page 1 (Supplement)

LETTER FROM BROKEN HILL.

The following are extracts from a letter written from Broken Hill to a friend in Auckland :— A brief description of this desert land may be of interest. I say desert, for it is this iii all truth—not a blade of grass or anything green (except gum-trees along the creek watercourse). All our vegetables come from Adelaide; potatoes, onions, etc., from Mount Gambier district; in fact we cannot grow anything. Just fancy, no rain since last Christinas, and the winter months nearly over. All the domestic water has to be carted ten miles, and this is baled out of a water hole in the bed of a creek. I paid last week 7s (id for 100 gallons: rich, is it not, after leaving such an over-watered country like New Zealand ? But this is not the worst feature, as it is quite on the cards that many of the mines will have to shut down, as their tanks are nearly exhausted. If they do, it will be a terrible blow to the place. The Proprietary mine continues its enormous output, and when the three additional furnaces get in full swing, the anticipated weekly yield will be 100,000oz of silver. 400 tons bullion giving the lucky shareholders £4 to £5 per share monthly div. Very handsome, is it not? Sully has 200 original shares. There have been some very rich lodes struck along the same line of reef, and ii is merely a question of time to have many other dividend-paying mines. 1 believe it is going to be a big place. The country for a radius of 50 or 60 miles is taken up by mining leases, but strange to say, nothing hitherto has been found payable in (/old. 'I he metals arc principally silver, lead, and iron in abundance. Im mining is attracting great attention, but so far nothing is known about its payability or otherwise. BroKen Hill township consists mainly of corrugated iron structures, but large stone and brick hotels and warehouses are rapidly spreading. The population is estimated at 12,000 to 1-1,000, and such a mixed crowd you never saw. We have hotels and drinking shanties in galore; churches of every denomination, theatres, concert halls, skating rinks, etc.: in fact every facility given for fools to part. . The first six weeks I lived at an hotel. Fortunately business affairs kept me at it until ten o'clock every night, so when I got home (?) you may imagine sleep and rest (more than billiards or whisky) were what I wanted. But such drinking, swearing, fighting, and " He's a Jolly Good Fellow,' sickened me. Besides I had frequenly one or two fellows camped in my room, and for all these luxuries had to pay the modest sum of £4 4s per week, washing extra, and if I did not like it was told I could " clear," as there were plenty of other applicants for my room. This is a devil of a place for high charges. Timber, Baltic and New Zealand white pine, 20s per 100 ; corrugated iron, 7id to 8d per foot lineal.