AUCKLAND.

Otago Witness, Issue 556, 26 July 1862, Page 2

AUCKLAND.

Verdakt Ambition.— There is a tendency in the present day, not to be sufficiently deprecated, to consider the old-fashioned virtues things to be sneered clown, as unworthy of this ■enlightened age. The per&ons who do this are generally those who desire a respectable mantle to cover evil thoughts and evil deeds ; persons who are not quite prepared to lose the respect of intelligent, upright friends, mid yet have a foolish ambition to be considered to be defiantly knowing in wickedness, by a class unrecognisable in decent society. You will sometimes hear such a one remark, with a lofty sweeping away of the old landmarks of integrity, "Oh, nobody inquires about a man s character now-a-days ; if one goes into that his list of acquaintances would he few indeed "' Heaven give us the " few" then ! We care not what talent soever a person may possess if the feeling above expressed finds voice through it. No superstructure, how dazzling soever, built on this corrupt foundation, has any charms for us. And if there is one sight more disgusting than another, it is such verdant attempts in a young man to show himself as he calls it, "superior to the prejudices of the a"c. ! '— Fern Leaves. °

Which is the Most Perfect Popular Government I— That, said Bias.where the Laws have no superior. That, said Thnles, where the inhabitants are neither too rich nor too poor. That, .=aid Anacharsis, the Scythian, where virtue is honored and vice detested. That, said Pittacus, whose dignities are always conferred upon the virtuous, and never upon ths base. That, said Cleobulus, where the citizens fear blame more than punishment. That, said Chilo, where the laws are more regarded than the orators. That (say the moderns), wheie the lawt, are duly administered. Thai, said Solon, where an injury done to the meanest subject is an insult upon the whole constitution. — Apophthegmsof the Anoieu's New SuTrj,BMENT.— Thirteen gentlemen, each contributing £1000, are about to start for the land discovered by Burke, in order to found a settlement. —Castlemnivc Advertiser, July 8. TnE Escoup Ro««ERy.-.A dispatch has been received from mV r'lerterick Pottinger, which reports that he had ti-a^k ■ s the escort robbers to the Victorian borders. At JJay he had found six jaded horses. He believes that tlu robbers were Victorians, and was about to follow them further. The black tracker believed ths police would yet overtake them.— Border Post, July 5. A Spanish Founblino Hospital.— We next visited La C'imu, or the Foundling Hospital, containing C/e hundred unfortunate children. On entering the Patio we heard a distant .sound, as of innumerable litte! s_ of puppies whining ; on nearer approach it turned into a deafening and piteous wail of helpless infants ; they all peemed to want to be nurse'l at the same time — and it is very possible they did so, seeing that only one wet nurse is allowed for three or four infants. The long ward was divided down the centre by two rows of stone pillars ; at each side of these, in a double row, were placed cradles on stands, each containing an infant. The bedding was clean, and a muslin curtain thrown over the crib to protect the infant from the mosquitoes. It was piteous to hear the continued wail. We raised the muslin curtains of several of the cribs. The pinched-up features of ihe sleeping, and restless tossing of the crying, were most painful to see and hear. These infants were from three to ten days old ; they are then sent to the country to be reared. At eight or ten years of age, if not reclaimed or adopted into the family, where they were nursed, they are sent to charity schools to remain till they get employment. We could nor Jearn whether .the mortality was great, or whether r.r not they turned out well when they jmve<} at years of discretion. We omitted to say tliat neiu- th ' entrancts-eate there is a turning box, into wjbich the unnatural parents place their infants : a matron att- 1 <h in a room immediately behind this rawy to receive them.— A Family Tour Round flu> toasti of, Bpai n and Portugal. Jiy Lady DuvJbar. A wag rose from his bed on the 31st of last August, gdeggajined— " This is the last rose of summer."

(from -ran DAiirr times correspondent.) Auckland, Bth July, 18G2. In spite of the depressing influence of the weather, which continues as bad as fondest heart (of duck) cVaM wish, there is v steady advance jn the liveliness of th ; s city ; and, therefore, I a.m happy to say, th^re is a corresponding lightening of the bur Jen laid upon the shoulders ot the purveyor of news, whether lor homo or a foreign maiket. Yesterday, indeed, the liveliness of Auckland was such as to amount to a, sensation, caused, not indeed by what you would naturally expect — either a monster nugget, or an inroad of the Waikato tribes— but by the ne vs of the loss of the White Swan, on her way to Wellington, bearing our collective wisdom — which, by the way, may perhaps have proved too heavy for her — together with a great number of the documents likely to be called for at the meeting of the " house." That all these have been lost (the documents, not the lawgivers, I mean,) .will necesbarily prove a veiy heavy loss, both in pecuniary r.nd other ways. And how any decree can become law now, is a difficult problem, seeing that the great seal of the colony has shared the fate of the dying Swan. From these and other reasons, the excitement was great in Auckland when the news arrived, which it dil per Lord Worsley, yesterday afternoon. Of course, the first feeling whs thankfulness that no lives had been lost. Had it indeed been otherwise, it would have been the most terrible disaster yet experienced in the colony^ The number of passengers being so great, and the position of some of then so important, the misfortune was not, however to Auckland mind.3 by any means of an unmitigated character, and some are even bold enough to imagine that the loss of some documents and letter-books, not to speak of the "Great Seal," will not be too great a price to pay, for the cessation of this new system of peripatetic law-making ; and, indeed, there is no doubt that this assembly will be in consequence,, far the most expensive ever yet held in New Zealan.l. If I remember rightly, ;it the time of my last letter, the Coromandel field was just in the very act of being opened, and some anxiety was expressed concerning the conduct of diggers in a certain gully or " driving creek," which had the credit of being richer than its yet untried neighbors. This difficulty has, however, been got over satisfactorily, owing to the quiet good sense of the majority of the diggers. Lots were drawn for the creek, which was every inch taken up at once ; Mr, Turton. the Commissioner, issued 1(50 licenses during the first day, and the demand has continued good ever since, so th.it we may now believe that nearly all our home .-tock of lcgul.ir diggers are now employed. The excessive wet has been a great hindrance to the progress of work In the gullies, which now contain torrents of water from tho high ranges above; still the mineis sesm nothing daunted ; it makes io, however, the more difficult to say with certainty what the results of these surface diggings may be, As yet the general success does not appear to have been great. One man indeed, named Watson, has hit upon a good nugget, weighing about two pounds, 7.) per cent, of which is gold, and very goo 1 specimens are beitKj; found by others ; but upon the whole, I do not yet see reason to withdraw what I have before said about our alluvial diggings if such exi^t, being yet unfound ; our real find lias been, I am persuaded, thcqiiaitiC reefs which, the more they aie examined, seem to give the better hopes of a rich return. It will, however, be a, return for a, large money outlay, and this takes away from it the character of a poor man's diggings. Steps arc being taken in Auckland to work these reefs in a business-like manner. The " Keven's Reef Quartz Crushing Company" has been formed, all the shares being at once seized upon, and at a nioccting of the shareholders on the 4th, arrangements were made for the carrying on business as soon as possible; office-bearers were elected, and this mail carries the orders for the necessary plant to Australia. Another company is also being formed with the same capital as the former (£10,000), only in thi* case, in ten pound shares, with limited liability. It has not yet come to maturity, however. It has been sometimes, although very erroneously stated, that the Coromandel gold was as yt-t invisible or neaily so in thi-, city. This can now be said no longer, as any one may now see a really splendid specimen at the bank of NNcrw r South Wales office, which weighs more than two • pounds and is very lich; indeed, from the manner in which thequartz and gold arc combined here, as I described in my last, all the specimens found seem to contain a very larsre per eenttge of gold. Perhaps also this may in some degrc^iccouut for the comparative poverty of the alluvial diggings. News has been received from the party who started, • as I mentioned, to explore the Mercuryßay District; they had, of course, only j use arrived, .and although an enthusiastic member of the party writes that their prospects are splendid, I imagine they owe much to the brilliant coloring of his own "ardent spirit from the fact, also mentioned, that it has poured all the time since they arrived, and a prospect must be brilliant indeed that glitters very brightly under continuous north-westerly rain. Speaking of the effect of our golden prospects upon the general spirit of Auckland, I should have mentioned what a blessing it has been to the " Daily Southern Crons," whose existence, I fear, would have proved a shoH and an unblessed one, had it not been for the kind assistance of Coromandel. The " Cross"' declares its mission to be that of the poor man's frit- nd, seeking in return . only the poor man's blessings aiuHhreepences, and in advocating his rights one day to extra wages, and the next administering a sage rebuke to him for venturing as yet even to think of asking such a thing ; ia dismissing to-day the obduracy of a hard-hearted ministry, who refused to give Sir George Grey money "to buy the Coromandel 1 md, and the next in a perfect furor of delight that it had been leased rather than purchased. The '• Cross" fulfils its mission, and is happily enabled also to fill its columns. The truth nbout that money question seems to be, that Mr. Maclean was the person, whose decision was final, for he gave it as his opinion that no good title could be obtained for the land without Te Hint's consent. That gentleman, it seems, lias now accepted .£6OO from Lydia as compensation for his wounded honor and rights. The future payments are to belong to Lydia, whilst the sovereignty (or mana) of the land remains with Te Ilira. On Wednesday last, a Board of Works was elected for the City of Auckland under the law lately passed, and full time it is that they were at work, for certainly for many years there lias been no such mud in the streets as now. The end of Queen street, r.ext die wharf, is a, perfect hea of mud, which will shortly become impassable if something be not done. To crown the difficulty, however, the now Board has no treasury chest | or at least, if possessed of th.it useful article, they have no treasure a-s yet to put into it What they will do I cannot tell ; indeed, I don't fancy they are quite pure themselves as yet. Some of them are said to have spoken about getting 20,000 cubic yards road metal laid down, and this is probably none too much, but would unfortunately cost about £10,000, which might prove awkward. lam glad to be able to make the addition of our new Savings' Bank to our very limited list of metropolitan, or even conn try, town looking public buildings. This neat little structure quite surpasses all our other banks at present, though how long it .will do so does not yet appear. It is a very pretty building, facing Queenstreet, its front being built of Hoburt Town freestone, tastefully carved above the windows and along the parapet. Nor does its interior at all disappoint the favorable opinion obtained from the outside. Its rooms, eight in number, are well finished, and of a good height (18 feet). It has also a fire proof cellar of large size, capable of containing all the papers of value which even its extensive business can require for many years to come. I am surprised to see that r.o Savings' Bank exists at Dunedin, as ours has done so very well but perhaps in a great gold colony no one has time to make, or if made, to preserve small savings.

The meeting of our proposed Gas Company's friends takes place this afternoon, and the company, it is believed, will be regularly formed. Calculations made by Mr. Smith, CMC, place, I believcj the cost of the undertaking at something like (£1G,000) sixteen thousand pounds, and he is strongly of opinion that it will be an excellent speculation. This seems almost a certainty now from the large number of mercantile houses, who would consume much gas. We have likewise a Steamboat Company under weigh, with a capital of (£10,000) ten thousand pounds ; they are going to bui'ii a steamer of about 100 tons register, to trade near Auckland, I suppose in the gulf, which will, I don't doubt, give ample employment to one steamer of that size. Regarding the natives, the Waikato Kingites, still, I believe, afford matter for a few interesting letters from the Cross' correspondents on the Waipa, who must either have very little work to

do, or be very will paid for ilu-ir writing"., as these are so regular, se» arcistic, s>nd ro voiumin-

ous. Beyond iillinsj; a vacant corner of the C'/oss, however, I much doubt whether any otner effect is produced by the Waikatos or fieir chroniclers. Something the disappoiulo 1 Kinjjites must do, an.l talking is a hoaltliy ;ri I pleasing evcrcUu for them.