STATEMENT OF THE-MEN".

Otago Daily Times, Issue 218, 20 August 1862, Page 5

STATEMENT OF THE-MEN".

We started on a prospecting trip about the Ist of February last, crossing the Molyneux at Oliver's, and striking it again about twenty miles above Pinkerton's. We here obtained sufficient prospects from the banks of the river to justify us in believing that we should find rich diggings higher up the streams, or as soon as we came to a favorable place. About twelve or fifteen miles below the junction of the Mnnuherikia we first obtained payable prospect- -"c tried a-number of small bars that we thought would pay about an ounce a-day by working with a cradle. The river was very high at th.- time, and but little of the bars being out of vuter, we could not tell m ich about it, but the diggings on this; part of. the river will not possibly be of much extent. There are, however, for ten or fifteen miles below where we obtained our prospects—flats, and what appear to be old channels of the river, some of them several miles in length. We attempted to prospect several of them, but having no bucket or rope, and besides having the misfortune to break our shovel so as to render it valueless for sinking, we were not able to bottom, and were obliged to push on.. The rich part of the river where we obtained the gold is between the Manuherikia and Upper Clutha Valleys. By the time we arrived here our provisions were exhausted, and our tin dish broken by a fall on a hill-side, so that we could only wash a few handfuls of dirt at a time. We bought a little flour, and borrowed a tin dish from one of the stations in the Manuherikia Valley, and panned out forty ounces in about a week. We then went up the river as far as the junction of the Kawarau, and having satisfied ourselves that there was plenty more gold to be had, we started for Dunedin to get pack-horses and an outfit for a winter campaign. We returned by the way of Waikouaiti and the Shag Valley. We did not cross the river at the old place, as we wished to avoid the people at the station, who had seen us before* Onr object was to work only the richest spots, as we did not know how soon we might be discovered and "rushed." For the first month or six weeks, we were well satisfied with two or three ounces a day each, but as the river became lower, and we learned more of the nature and extent of the diggings, we did not wash anything unless we thought it would pay about a pound weight a day—that is, six ounces each. The best dirt we found was the surface dirt on the bars. We did not usually wash more than from three to six inches of the top dirt—a loose sandy gravel easily washed, but in some places we took from one to two feet of it. We bad nothing to do but to set the cradle at the edge of the river, and keep it going from morning to night, as one could get dirt and feed the cradle as fast as the other could wash it. The gold is very fine, and accompanied by a great quantity of black sand, from which it is difficult to separate it. The gold we got on the bed rock is heavier, but we did not ■work any scarcely after the first month or so, as we found that we could not expect to make more than from one to four ounces a day, although we

did find several good crevices, from one of which we took over twelve ounces in a few hours. There are high terrace-like banks or bars ou both sLles of the river, in some places several hundred j'ards in width, and composed, to a great extent, of washed quartz gravel and* boulders. In several places there are what appear to be old channels of the river, some ot them of considerable length. "We dtt not work above the ju.iction of the Ka\/ai-u. but there was every ludwation'of rich L?>gin« s ot the Ujprr * l( ai id VJley :m,l »n tie hill sides,, therd arc numbers of large quartz reefr. Very little ram tails m this part of the country; we did not lose more than two days altogether by wet weather. The winter is the best time for working along the banks of the river as it js highest during the spring and summer and many of the places that-we worked will be under water. The best way to get there is to take the Shag Valley Road from Waikouaiti to the Manuherikia Valley, but persons on foot or-horseback can go by the West Taieri, Campbell Thompson's and Valpys. This is the. way-we came down, and is much the shortest.

.. . CONDITIONS OP REWARD. Hie conditions agreed to between the Provincial Government and Messrs. Hartley and lutey, the discoverers, are, that they are to receive a reward of £2,000, on receipt m three months of 16000 oz. of gold the produce of the locality. The men are to give every possible information as to the gold-producing spots, and explain the mode of working—one or both men to go with a Government party, and point out the locality.

The gold field is to be not less than five miles from any place where 100 miners are working, and if the place has been discovered and worked by any other party before the date of disclosure of the discovery, the reward to Hartley and Riley is to lapse. ££The men state that they were tracked and discovered by a Victorian miner to the very spot where, they were getting their richest yields on one of the river bars, but so ignorant was lie-of the system of working that they succeeded by doleful statements of disappointment, and by saying they were only just " making tucker " to disarm the suspicions of the man, and he left them without suspecting the richness of the place.

The men state that the ordinary system of mmmii hv Victorhn'miners is no good. There is plenty of bush and available timber.