THE TUHUA GOLD DISCOVERY.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 68, 11 May 1872, Page 15

THE TUHUA GOLD DISCOVERY.

The Alexandra correspondent of the Southern Cross has been making further inquiries respecting the above field and has teiegraped the result. In his message he says that the field is alluvial and that Rewi has a number of nice nuggets in his possession. The whole district is said to be of ckv slate formation. He says:—As far back as twenty years ago gold was picked up in the bottom of some of the creeks falling into the Kawhia harbor. This fact was well known to many of the old settlers. The district where the gold is found, it will thus be seen, is not confined to the banks of the Taringamutu River, but embraces a large area of ground all round Tuhua as a centre. Northward of the head waters of the Taringamutu are very large grassy plains, embracing tens of thousands of acres. These plains bear every appearance of being dried-up lakes of former ages, everywhere having a gravelly or shingly bottom. These plains are believed to be also within the gold-bearing area, because they are to the south of Kawhia harbor, where gold has been found, and north of Tuhua and Taringamutu. There is every reason to believe that they are gold-bearing, and if so it is hard to say where the boundaries of the Southern goldfield may be. Perhaps it is a continuation of - the Coromandel peninsula, across the central portion of the province. I may say that if the goldfield is confied to the Taringamutu district, Mokau would be the nearest and most convenient port to the goldfield. It is distant from the Taringamutu, about fifty miles. For fully one-half of the way the country is somewhat broken, but the natives say a road could be made much easier than many a track at the Thames and Coromandel. I told you before that Tuhua was distant from here about fifty miies as the crow flies, and I now learn that following the native track round by Te Kuiti, is about seventy miles. From Tokana in the Taupo district one of the posts occupied by the Armed Constabulary, the Taringamutu is distant about forty miles. To Wanganui is the longest way of all, but it is said open valleys exist from the head of the navigation on that river. -If the boundaries of the goldfield extend northward, as I believe they will, an easy track to Kawhia harbor may yet be found.

The field does not need puffing up ; it only requires to be opened up by the Government for European prospectors. A settler at Cambridge sends a letter to the New Zealand Herald from which we extract:—“ The season is too far advanced to get to Tuhua by the way of Taupo; the road at the base of Tongariro boing snowed up. The best way to get there during the winter, is either by Taranaki or Mokau. When at Oruanui, I was informed by the natives that gold had been found at a certain place near the lake, and that two natives had gone to Napier for the purpose of arranging with the Government for opening the countfy for gold mining. After some little trouble, I succeeded in inducing them to take me to the place; and although I did not find gold there, I found sufficient indications of it to enable me to assert that its discovery is a mere question of time. The rocks under, laying the pumice formation are similar to those at the Thames. The only difference that I could detect was that he quartz in the different leaders I examined is amphorous, while at the Thames it is crystalline. Some of the veins in the clay slate had been converted by intense heat intojaspar. “At my suggestion, the native owners of a large tract of land near the lake have written to the Superintendent, requesting him to send a competent person to prospect the country, they finding him in provisions, and means of transport. You need have no doubt about the gold at Tuhua. I believe it will be one of the richest goldfields in the colonies. The natives on the line of road between Cambridge and Taupo are exceedingly anxious to have the two places connected by a good road.”