GOLD IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

Westport Times, Volume IV, Issue 634, 19 March 1870, Page 3

GOLD IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA.

Some recent gold discoveries in South Australia, have begun to attract attention. The alluvial ground at Barossa has bc:en systematically worked, and the prospectors are still spreading themselves around in the scrub. Reefing companies have not succeeded, owing to the absence of defined leads, the gold being disseminated through a peculiar cement. Prom an ounce to an ounce and a half per ton has not been a rare yield for the cement-crushers, of which there are now two on the ground. When Barossa had had its day, Balhannah showed up. This deposit—a conglomerate of gold, silver, bismuth, and several other metals not yet identified—is on private land, up the river Onkaparinga. It has been partially developed by an Adelaide company, and shipments of bismuth have been sent to England. Pending the determination of its market value, operations are not being rapidly pushed. The Blumberg discovery professes to be a reef, and it is on private property. The speculators, who purchased it from tenants holding under a pre-emp-tive right, have so far done well with their bargain. It cost them £720 altogether, to cover which they issued 60 shares of the nominal value of £SO, and reserved other 60 of the same value as promoters' shares. The latter have been inflated by a judicious exhibition of specimens to £l3O, and the former are selling at 100 per cent premium. A telegram from the Barossa gold diggings states that the only party who had tried deep sinking have struck the lead at 80 feet, and are getting one ounce and a half of gold to the load. Over 60 claims have been at once peggeu out in tue immediate neighborhood. Further sinking at the Blumberg has resulted in the reef being struck in two places.