The New Gold Era.

Otago Witness, Issue 1974, 19 September 1889, Page 12

The New Gold Era.

Bditoe Witness,— Sir : The introduction of the dredging process upou our alluvial goldfield raises a very important consideration affecting the iuterests of the colony at lar^e, aud demanding veiy prompt attention. It is now. proved that very extensive areas which were comparatively xvorthless under former processes will by the wholesale process of dredgiug yield untold riches. In your issue of the 7th inst. Mr B. Foord writes :— " A dredge driven by a steam en^iue of 50-horae power, dredgiog 20ft deep and 15ft high, will, under ordinary couditious, work 80 tons of ground per hour, and the expenses will average as follows : Coal, £25; wagbS, £38; oil and waste, £1 10*; d< J pixui.*tion, £22 ;— ur £86 10s per wet-k for sa> 9600 v,r 2 16<1 p<-r t< n. Averaging 2ar of gold tLis would yield £150, ami pay adirid< ud of 80 per cent, on €6000— the otitu such a dr**<sg<> Would probably co-t " The published r<jfurn«> from the Shotover and of the Waipapa Beach Company, and the reports of sea b j acb proapectiogs at the mouth of the Molyneux (the gold having travelled down the rivers trom the Shotover district) show how extensive the areas are which are destined to yield up their wealth to the dredge, and how enormous that wealth will be. For this class of mining the heroic age is passed, and happily to a large exbent the speculative element is eliminated, a few prospectings by shafts or borings in a river bed or sea bench, to the depth. that a dredge can work being sufficient to reveal approximately the average number of grains of gold per eubio yard of earth a given area will

yield, leaving to speculation only the unknown treasures which may lie here and there in pockets or patches on alluvial bottoms.- Now, Sir, the uonlienated portions of these rich areas in the rivers and on the sea coast east and west are public estate, and their respective values bsing as easily ascertainable by Government as by private prospectors, the question arises : ought not the Government with the least possible delay to ascertain their values, survey them, and divide them into olaims, and issue a book (similar to the Crown Lands Guide) descriptive of them, placing upon them an upset price, and offering them at auction, that the country may get something like their value for them? — a process which should in time pay off the public debt and provide ample funds for all needful public works; for these areas are enormous, and, in the presence of the dredge, so enormously rich that when the facts are widely known the rush upon them will be unprecedented. You say, Sir, in your issue of September 3 : " The Wakalip Mail states that something like 100 miners' rights have been issued for the Lakes district, during August." This is but the beginning, and claim? are being taken up by the mile instead of the chain, a process which should be immediately arrested. It would be interesting to know how many who never turned a shovel, or wielded a pick, or handled a prospects ing dish, are just now quietly in quest of unappropriated portions of these rich areas, over which claims can at present be instituted for almost nothing. — I am, &c., St. Olair, Sept. 12. Edwaed Walker.