BACK FROM KIMBERLEY.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 770, 3 December 1886, Page 30

BACK FROM KIMBERLEY.

ARRIVAL OF THE KENTISH LASS.

The arrival iu port last night week at about six o’clock of the barque Kentish Lass, Captain Holm, caused a good deal of excitement in Wellington, the vessel having on board as passengers a number of men who recently left Wellington to try their fortunes at Kimberley, and were now returning not at all in good circumstances, aud anything but delighted with their experiences and fortunes on the western side of Australia. The returned diggershail from, and are now bound to, various part 3 of New Zealand, but the majority of them belong to Wellington, the names of whom are as follows :—J. Tidswell, C.' Randall, H, Rod, T. Whitton, J. Drysdale, B. Drysdale, T. Moore, R. Dewess, R. Tupin, R, Carter, J. Gibson, G. Phillips, S. W. McCallum, J. Gibson, Bidder, sen., Bidder, junr., Ffrost, Fleet, Holmes, S. B. Penny, J. Preston, C. Lawlor. Saloon Messrs Matbeson, S. Webb, D. Babbott, Openheim, T. Forman, O. Morgan. The Kentish Lass came from Wyndkam, and she anchored lastnight week off the end of the Railway Wharf. A representative of this journal went off to the vessel and interviewed several of the men. The very general opinion the diggers have of Kimberley is, as might be expected, not at all favorable. They describe it tersely as “aduffer.” The country is said to be as black and as barren as you can imagine a country to be. The diggers’ port is Wyndham, situated about 280 miles from Kimberley ; “and,” said one man, “there isn’t enough wood on the country there to boil a billy with--nothing but stone and sand—a regular desert.” The climate at Wyndham does not appear to have at all suited the New Zealanders. They say, probably with an , excusable exaggeration, that the thermometer is always 126 in the shade there. When the Kentish Lass arrived at Wyndham, water was being sold at sixpence a bucket, and everything else was proportionately costly. Although, as a rule, the men were healthy, several of them suffered severely from fever and ague ; and of the 84 who went away by the barque three or four months ago, 30 or 40 have now returned. It is said there are about 1500 people on the diggings, most of whom are stuck there for want of money to get back home again. At the time the Kentish Lass was there, there were nine vessels bringing away diggers to Fremantle and Port Darwin—to any place that was some distance away from the field where so many men had come to grief. . '/ P' In view, of the stories which have at different times been circulated about, “big finds” at Kimberley, our reporter particularly asked for information about the nuggets. The men are emphatically sceptical on the subject. They say—not one or two, but many of them —that the most gold that has been obtained by any man is about 10 ounces, and that the man who got that was four months in finding it. They have, in short, only one description of Kimberley—that it is “a duffer.” Horses were at first a good marketable commodity, and a horse was worth £4O; but when the rush failed the price went down wonderfully, and when the Kentish Lass left a horse’s price was £2. Thus, it will be seen that the Kimberley diggings, as far as these men know—and there is no reason for doubting their statements —are a failure. The men who left here a few months ago well stocked and accoutred have now returned, many of them n very bad circumstances.