GOLDFIELDS ROADS.

Thames Advertiser, Volume VIII, Issue 2171, 12 October 1875, Page 3

GOLDFIELDS ROADS.

; To the Editor of the Thames Advertisir. Sin,—At the present time one of tho mines ou the flat has stopped sinking and pumping, arid that one stoppage has caused our streets to bo filled with many men out of employ, and'storckeepers and others to bo immediately talking of bad ' times. Why is . this, and why are tho r Thames people content; it should be so;' - and that " its prosperity or depression should depend on two .or three mines in or adjacent to the township, when thero is no necessity or reason for its being so ? There are many known mines, whoso yields have been and are nowfarrioher than those of the mines on the WaioEarakft flat, and yet they are idle or else a few men are working in them and having only stuff carted dowh and . crushed in which gold is visible, leaving, at the mouth of the drives or throwing,-: ajvay with their mullock qiiarlz that is k known to crush well. These mines , are .- idle simply because no roads are madfi to ; them, they being from one . and, a-half to four miles back ranges, and not from any impossibility to construct tho roads, but just because the Thames people are content that they should'remain unmade. It appears to me that unless the Thames people awako from their lethargy this gold field will soon drop into tho hands: of - a few capitalists to do with as they like, It is.nobody's duty to insist on tho! Government making roads info- the back • country, and nobody does 'it, yet if these back country road's were made, the powers that be putting on the screw/ the stoppage ? of a Bright Smile would not .be of that vast moment such matters are now. It costs nearly as much at the present time to sledge quartz from tho Hick Whiffles • claim to the batteries as it does to carry it from Auckland to Knglaud; tho owners ' of that claim are paying 30s a ton for • sledging their quartz down, and are, I am told, throwing away stuff (hat they have .proved to yield one ounce to the ton.' Should such things be; might not tho. big pump stop any day, and if so, wliero would the people be then who are now , content to depend on tho returns from mines, solely relying upon tho big pump and the pumps of tho Bright SmiloP— I am, &c., Miner. Thames, October 11. * 1