THE ROMANCE OF GOLD.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13874, 7 October 1908, Page 4

THE ROMANCE OF GOLD.

VISIT TO THE OLD KAPANGA. A GULLY OF SPECIMENS.:/ DEEP LEVEL DEVELOPMENT. No. IV, BY OUR .SPECIAL MINING REPORTER. ■' Coeomandel, Tuesday. At the present time probably no area on the Coromandel .field presents a more romantic phase than does that owned by the Old Kapanga Company. This property lias reached a stage in its history which most of the old hands have been awaiting for years. In the order taken in this series of articles the Old Kapanga is in itself the third of the important mining propositions that present themselves at Coromandel. The first is the deep level development of the Kauri Block, in which the Old Hauraki group of mines is contained, and the second the more thorough exploitation of the Tokatea Hill group. ; It is not suggested that either of these sokemes calls for immediate attention. The amount of capital involved is necessarily .a check to enterprise of so extended a nature, and whilst gold can bo got by "pottering" about in the adit levels shareholders will be slow to undertake the larger ventures. What is suggested, however, is that the real future and permanence of the CoromandeLfield depend upon some such schemes being carried out, as sooner or later they' will be. The Kapanga proposition promises to be the first one carried out. It only requires the formal settlement of the reconstruction arrangements, and the company will be in a position to nnwater the mine, go to work at the 1000 ft level, and test the truth of traditional tales of gold waiting to be picked up in the low levels. LUCKY KAPANGA TRIBUTERS. Escorted by Mr. Homibrook, manager of. the Old Kapanga, I first visited, on my third day here, the scene of Martin Brothers' tribute. The air of romance hung round the little gully, at the bottom of which we found the winze in which, this party is working. On one hand I was shown the old Albion workings, now idle, and out of which 80,000oz of gold were got in one small block. On the other hand, I was given a peep at Von Tempaky's shaft and tunnel—the first over driven in New Zealand. A little.' way from the winze was the spot in Driving Creek where the first specimens were discovered in the country. I found that the Martins are working about 130 ft down' in the old stopes on the Albion run of gold in the Kipanga reef. Their last crushing gave a return of £400, of which £300 worth of stone was easily held in a small bag. The tribute is a speaking testimony to the assertion that no mine in Coromandel can be said to be worked out. In one of the old etopes there was a place /where, in timbering, slabs had been put over quartz in which gold was showing. 'Evidently, in the old days, they were getting such rich gold out that mere specimens were not considered to be worth bothering about. At any rate, the " leavings" are proving acceptable enough to this party of tributers. - Some of the stone they were breaking out when I was there, from about Ift of crushing dirt, showed coarse gold freely right through it. One piece was broken for me, and proved to be , so thickly impregnated with the precious metal that it bent when struck, and had to be twisted in halves. Some of the stone was worth quite Soz to th© pound. A fact that may be noted here is that in the company's ground at the 300 ft level a drive is in to within 200 ft of this Albion, run of gold, which is . paying Martin Brothers so handsomely. The ground also is intact from the 200 ft level to the :1000ft level, 'never "I having been * worked: deeper than the former distance. ■-. WHAT THE PAST HAS SHOWN. A better understanding of the position as regards the company's own workings in the Old Kapanga mine may be led to by the statement here of '" t what lias already been proved in the workings. Between the surface and the 600 ft level good gold. was obtained. From the latter to Ibe 900 ft level a poor class of country came in, which was anything but gold-bearing.' When the shaft, reached a depth of 940 ft, a large reef of mineral ore, about 4ft wide, and lying pretty flat, was discovered. This mineral oar or reef was the means of causing the lodes to change their courses entirely, and good gold was obtained in other reefs which had never been seen in the upper levels. At the 1000 ft level, when the rails, etc., were being withdrawn, prior to i-tho flooding of the mine, a small box of specimens was sent to the surface, and never a pick has been in- that ground since. A borehole was sunk from the bottom of the shaft, before the water was allowed to rise, for a further 225 ft, from which- point the; core brought up, from a totally different and unknown reef, quartz in which rich, heavy gold, plainly visible to the naked eye, was found. This is the prospect upon which the company has recently gone to the . shareholders with a reconstruction scheme. •,;■■ ; THE PRESENT position. - At present the water, is just being kept clear of ; the flatsheet at the 300 ft level. I explored the shaft, which, by the way, -was very hot, though the pump was temporarily at a standstill. In the 300 ft level some men were employed prospecting onthe hangingwall branch of the Kapanga reef in a northerly direction, or. towards the Albion run, where I had seen Martin's party working. A few pounds of sfcne broken down from this hangingwall branch \ for my inspection proved to contain strong gold, some of which was very coarse. A peculiar enough feature was that the stone contained metallic arsenic, and also calcite,in both of which the gold occurred. Pieces broken showed the precious metal to goright through, and as gold was left owing in the face, Mr. Homibrook decided to; continue; developing the leader here. It traverses the ground for Borne distance north, where it has not been touched. Beyond " fossicking" and ' pumping, the only work in progress was the cleaning up ; of No. 3 level. There are thousands of fathoms of ground opened up in] the different levels of the Old Kapanga, in which the reefs are not worked, consequently the unwatering of the mine will make these available. There is a revival of interest in the district in a scheme that has been mooted previously to bring in an adit level from the Kikowhakarere beach to the Old Kaj>anga shaft, at the 300 ft level. This would mean driving 3000 ft. The chief advantage claimed for such a tunnel is that all the water above the 300 ft level could be drained off through it, thus obviating the necessity for further pumping from the surface to 300 ft. Nearly all the water is accumulating between those points, and' there is not much to be coped with below the 420 ft level, except what drains through from the surface. The tunnel would also prove an easy and economical means for the delivery of coal and supplies. Not only so, but it would open up a considerable area of country for prospecting. The progress of operations in the Old Kapanga, when the reconstruction scheme in complete, will, it is apparent, be attended with interest. It is desirable that sufficient capital to do the work thoroughly should be made available, for much of the hope of a renewal of activity at Coromandel depends upon the Old Kapanga's work in the approaching future. '■:-•,

THE SOUTH KAPANGA. ; The only work I found in progress in the South Kapanga mine comprised a drive oh Scotty's reef hillwards. This lode and its offshoots and the Kapanga traverse the ground from the northern end of the Kapanga mine, and in the early days were prolific gold-producers. At present Scotty's reef has been driven on for about 180 ft into the hill* .The formation was the full width of the drive, and had been that wide, and as much as 14ft in places, for some distance back. It was ( composed of white rubbly quartz, containing minerals,; but no gold. The country was good enough to make the result* disappointing, but with further pro. grass into th* lull ther* m » possibility ,©£.'* change :,":'■'':;»--:.-:■■ ■---•'.; ~. ' ; ;;.,.;■: %