RHODESIA.

Tuapeka Times, Volume XXXIV, Issue 4898, 9 October 1901, Page 4

RHODESIA.

Whatever opinioa may be held concerning the personal character of Mr Cecil Rhodes, and the wisdom of allowing a private company to control so vast a territory as that known a 8 Rhodesia, there can be little doubt tbat the experiment in regard to the latter has, up to the preßent, proved a BUCCBBB. Th& laiesfc report of the British South Africa Company, issued to the shareholders in August last, tells a tale of uniform progress, in spite of tbe unparalleled difficulties which had to be dealt with, owing to the outbreak of hostilities between Great Britain and tbe Boers. When one peruses the account of the establishment of a complex administration, the discovery aud development; of tbe mines, the formation of railways and the carrying out of telegraphic communication, it is difficult to realise tbat the country is only ten years old. Yet, noticeable as the progress of the colony is, there is ample evidence that its development will be more rapid in tbe immediate future, and tbat Efaodeefa will u/fcimately prove one of the most valuable of Great Britain's possessions in South Africa. Up to the present the principal source of riches has come from the

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mines, and although the time has not yet arrived for an exact estimate of their extent to be made, experience is strengthening confidence in their value. Coal is distributed over large areas, and copper and iron occur to an extent which has not yet been determined, but it ib upon the value of its gold reefs that the rate of the country's growth will depend. As showing the increase in the output from the gold* mines, it may be mentioned that for the year ending October, 1898, the total amounted to 12,7570z, aud for the following twelve months 67,1920z, while a return from the Bdawayo Chamber of Mines alums the value of the gold produced in the ten months preceding June, 1900, to have been £192,679. The present state|of|agriculture is experimental ; but the fact as stated by Mr Selous, the famous African traveller, that fifty years ago the country must have been thickly inhabited by a peaceful people, who grew abundant vegetable crops by very primitive methods oi cultivation, goea to prove that under more favorable conditions experienced farmers could make the land pay.

THE No Town correspondent of the M Grey St»r " states that % venernMe pioneer of the West Coast and other goldfielda of New Zealand, Mr Wallace Rangi, died on September 18. Raofifi was bora n«nr Wjngnui, and bt longed to a small bapo, or section, of tbe warlike N'gatiwai tribe, tbe time being a period of great unrest among the southern Maoris, before tbe advent of European settlement. When quite a ltd fUngi's people re* moved to O'Bk\, tben an important wb&ling station, and the captain of a whaler induced tbe lad 'a people to let him go to seu. On the discovery of gold in Victoria in the early fiftie* R»DRi, wijh some otber natives, wended his way tbttber, aud was very fortunate in his search for the yellow raet»l. Ha ama»s*d a large sum of money and then went to England and ecjoyed himself for a time, afterwards returning to New Zealand. Ia tbe early sixties, Ksngi, with a lot cf other miners, found his way to tbe Shotover River, but returned io the West Coast where be reaided for tfa« last 30 yesra or TOOTCr IU Rangi Creek, situated in tbe gorge between No Town Bnd Bed Jacks, be unearthed a nugget over 57 0z in weight, and worth about £220. The old age pension kept him from want in his deolioiug years.