LATER NEWS BY THE QUEEN.

Otago Witness, Issue 555, 19 July 1862, Page 2

LATER NEWS BY THE QUEEN.

AUCKLAND. (from the daily times special correspondent.) Auckland, 2nd July, 1862. I send you the Proclamation and Notices respecting the gold field at Coromandel. You will see that the Governor has proclaimed the Coromandel Peninsula, or rather all waste lands of the Crown situated there,-to be a gold field under the Act of 1 853 ; and that in order to provide for the digging on land still belonging to the natives, his Exellency intends to grant licences under the Na--tivo--Ij-rt«i-3?nrelTaie-<3rdinanco oir V 936. Nothing has been heard, so far as I can learn, of To Hira, since the agreement entered into with Lydia ami the lcsi'leut natives of Coromandel, for leasing j Paul's Land to the Government ; but I do not think it likely, that cither he or the King party will interfere by violence to prevent the diggers from going upon th« land. Some leservcs, comprising cultivations, burying places, and so foith, which have still been made by the natives, are now being surveyed, and it is hoped that the prospecting will go on quietly. The temporary regulations established by the Governor are in accordance with the wishes of the miners, as cxpiessed in meetings between them and the Commissioner ot Crown Lauds on the spot, and will serve all present purposes, pending the more complete system that will have to be put in force, if any quantity of gold should be found, and a large number of diggers locate themselves on the ground. On this point it is impossible, as yet, to form any opinion. A huge number of men have gone down from Auckland, and a great DJiinyTnore are preparing to go ; within a very short time, therefore, it will be ascertained whether there really exists a payable gold field at Coromandel, or not. The General Government, in a letter to the Superintendent here, have guarded themselves from being assumed to declare, by having proclaimed the gold field, that a payable field now exists. In compliance with the universal desire, they have opened the land to proper exploration, and it remains to be seen what will be the result. The accounts of the diggers themselves are very contradictory ; some say there is plenty of gold, others that it will turn out a " sliicer ;" and, at any rate, there has yet been no yield to justify very sanguine expectations. It cannot, however, be understood here why there should appear a desire in Olago to cry down the prospects of Coromnndel before the question has been thoroughly tested, as to whether there is a payable field. If that question bo eventually determined in the affirmative, its effects will be as good for the South as for the North. You have the alluvial diggings, which will attract a far larger number of miners than any quartz-reefing can do ; but, on the other hand, there will always be a large proportion of your diggers who will leave during the winter. Would it uot be much better that they should be retained in the colony, coming up to a Northern gold field during the winter months to work at the quartz reefs, and returning to the more remunerative alluvial diggings of Otago during the summer ? Instead of their returning to Australia, they would spend their time and money in New Zealand, and so benefit both North and South ; and, instead of its being any disadvantage U Otngo, that a payable field should be discovered at Coromandel, ft is a " consummation devoutly to be wishe-1" down there as well as here.

People in Auckland are surprised at the continued good return of your escorts, which keeps higher than was ever anticipated. I hear from people who have correspondence with Australia, that there can be no reasonable doubt of a great number coining down in the spring.

The day before yesterday a vessel arrived in 38 clays from San Francisco, with further news from the seat of war in America. The Federals seem to be having it their own way at last. New Orleans has fallen, the Merrimac has been blown up by the Confederates themselves, and a vast amount of their own property given to the flames by the planters. It is impossible, from the disjointed paragraphs which are culled from tho Attu California and other Californian newspapers, to arrive at anything like a connected account of what has been done. One never knows whether the Generals belong to the Federal or Confederate army, and the military movements are thorefore nearly unintelligible. 'Sufficient, however, appears, to make it certain that President Davis said rightly in his recent message to the Southern Congress, that tho Confederates had undertaken a more gigantic task than the means at their command would let them fulfil, when they as- ! sumed the offensive on the line of the Potomac. The overwhelming numbers which the Federals have brought into, action, have changed the aspect of affairs, and brought the horrors of war into the heart of the South, The proclamation of freedom to the slaves, by one of the Federal Generals, is the most striking " event in the recent .transactions, and must, if persevered in, and adopted as a general policy by the United States President, have an immense effect on the fortunes'of the war. Still; one does not see that the Southerners mean

to give in ; on the contrary, the Mqscovite selfdevotion, with which an immense amount of cotton lias been destroyed, and the evident intention of great numbers of the population to retreat into the interior, lead one to maintain the truth of the conviction, which has steadily gained ground in England — that the Southerners, though conquered, would not be subjugated, and that the re-union of all the States of the old Federation is impossible. The rumors that France and England were at leugth to interfere in the quarrel, can hardly rest on a good foundation ; certainly it is to be presumed, that after their recent triumphs, the United States Government will be in no humor to suffer the intervention of foreigners. As to the state of the Natives here, there is nothing new to communicate. The Governor left for Wellington in the Harrier yesterday, and I suppose the Session will really commence in earnest on the 7th ; when, it is said, that a great mass of papers will be presented, in illustration of all that has been done by Sir George Grey since he assumed the Government. But, as you will by the same mail that takes this, receive in all probability the intelligence of the opening of Parliament, I will not trouble you with any speculation as to the kind of policy that will be declared in his Excellency's opening speech. (from the daily times correspondent.) Auckland, Ist July, 1862. I take the opportunity of the mail by our west coast line of steamers, to put you in possession of a few days later news on the subject of our goldfields, and the steps which have been, and are being taken, for enabling them to pass out of the condition of household words, into that of national realities. I thus forestall my usual time of writing in the belief, that, as much news is sure to travel southwards, upon this subject, a little sober and altogether reliable information, bringing your knowledge up to the latest dates, will be welcomed at Otago, as not altogether valueless. In my last, I chronicled the proceedings whereby Sir George Grey gave so different a complexion to the state of our affairs at Goromandel. At that time the Harrier was at Coromandel, with the promised money (two years sent in advance), and a party of Government surveyors to mark off certain burying grounds and other sacred spots, bo that no careless digger might profane them. All has been accomplished satisfactorily to both parties, aud the final stroke has been put to the arrangement by a Government gazette, proclaiming Coromandel a gold field, on and after the first day of July. This announcement is followed by an Order in Council, making rules and regulations for the management of these gold fields, including one upon the subject of the miner's right, for which he is to pay the sum of one pound per annum; then one upon the subject of claims, defining their size, viz : for shallow sinkings, not more than 30 ft. deep 50ft. square iB the limit for quartz mining 50 feet along the reef by 300 feet in width. Short regulations follow, upon prospecting, river mining, and other details connected with gold fields. Then follows a notification, warning diggers that as it is a legal offence to occupy native lands for the purpose of mining ; unless the person so doing hold a license from the government; 'therefore it is notified, that on and after the Ist of July, tho Government will grant such licenses to dig upon the native lands at Coromandel, wh eh are now occupied although not purchased by the Government. This, with the form of license and the appointment of Mr. Turton as Receiver of Land Revenue, makes up this important document — perhaps the most important Gazette to the future of Auckland which has ever appeared. The immediate consequence of Sir George's success and proclamation are, as might be expected, that a good many people have started, and areon the eve of starting for Coromandel, undeterred by the character of the weather which continues to be as severe as ever, his winter, so far as it has gone, having been, I think, the wettest I have seen in this Province. From Coromandel itself the news is not of any importance, further than as it points to the future. Indeed whilst the arrangements have been pending with the Natives, the diggers seem, to a considerable extent, to have rested upon their oars (or pickaxes), in eager expectation of the event ; and since the purchase has been effected, the Resident Magistrate has apparently had much difficulty in preventing them from rushing at once upon Paul's covctted laud, which they well knew contained much gold ; and this, if from no other reason, from the face that several diggers had been in the habit of giving the Maories as ranch as £1 per day for leave to dig ; how much this il'.-judgea avarice must have increased the difficulty of Sir George's task, I must leave you to imagine. That gold is very plentiful in the quartz reefa which crop out in every direction upon Paul's block, rests upon testimony which none can doubt, but as regards the yield per ton, although reports and statements the most positive are daily made in the very best faith, yet I cannot advise yon to give more than a very moderate degree of credit to them, from the fact ihat no machinery exists in the Province capable of testing the matter in any wholesale manner ; and however impartial a man may intend to be, it is scarcely in human nature to avoid making choice of a promising looking piece of quartz for his experiment. Thus it is that we hear such wild statements as that a claim yields at the rate of 200 ounces to the ton of quartz, and from this down to the most modest estimate I have yet heard, viz., that the reefs would yield 10 ounces of gold and 20 of silver to the ton. Putting, however, rough guesses at a quantitative analysis aside, I can assure you that all, without, so far as I know, one exception, who have examined the reefs, give it as their opinion that richer quartz hoa nowhere been brought to light, and this seems highly probable, from the fact that in many pieces which have been broken off from the rock, the glitter of gold is visible to the naked eye. The specimens which I have examined are curiously dissimilar from the Australian type of quartz nugget, the gold seeming to be so inteifused amongst the stone, that without a microscope one cannot make out which is stone — which metal ; whilst in the Australian nuggets the gold is clearly distinct from the quartz. With respect to the washing claims, and their success, something seems to be going on ; at least, sufficient appearance of success has been made to induce something nearly approaching a disturbance. What the diggers call a driving creek at Kupanga, had been divided by lot at the request of a large majority of the diggers there. A few however, objected, and being now reinforced by the recent arrivals from Auckland, seem inclined to get up a row ; this, it is to be hoped, will soon be put a stop to, as the Commissioner of Police has been despatched to organize matters on the spot. As yet I have seen ho reason to change the opinion I expressed in one of my letters, that it is not likely any great success will be obtained by digging in the alluvium. I believe it will be found that the wealth of Coromundel exists chiefly in its quartz reefs. The Southern Cross and its conespondents keep blowing the trumpet most strenuously, puffing Coromandel and the Governor, and, by way of variations, introducing a little abuse of our "high and mighty" and " most incompetent ministers," who, " bad scran to them," are " playing at Legislation at Wellington," instead of doing something else here — which something else, however, the Cross says they arc utterly incompetent to do. Much of this very absurd, and is becoming not a little tiresome, even to those who, like myself, are not partisans of the ministry, but doubtless it is a hard matter to get up sufficient steam to force a newspaper into a sufficient daily circulation in a place like Auckland. 1 am glad to be able to say that the Messina arrived yesterday, after a passage of 175 days from London. She appears to have encountered a series of heavy gales, from which she lias received considerable damage. In the month of February her mainmast was badly sprung, her life boat staved, &c. Her arrival, and that of the Robert Small, will again replenish our stores, which were getting scarce of some descriptions of goods. The Custom receipts for last week at Auckland, were .£1709 11s, 4d. ; for the month of June they will, I believe, be fully £6000.