THE FITZROY DIGGINGS.
ROCKHAMPTON
FROM OUR SPECIAL COMMISSIONER
No. 5.
EVERYTHING here remains in statu quo, and but for the arrivals and departures there
would be a complete stagnation. Nothing doing -- no news -- no money stirring; all at
the very last point of hopelessness.
Many parties have been out in all directions prospecting the country, but all with one
result -- they have found nothing. A last effort is about to be made by a party of sixteen,
who intend to prospect the country in the neighbourhood of the Dee and the Don. Their
head quarters will be at Rannes, the station of Mr. Robison. Captain O'Connell has very
generously provided horses and guides, whilst the residents of Rockhampton have
subscribed the necessary funds for provisions. They are to be out for six weeks. At the
same time there are but small hopes entertained generally of any success attending this
expedition. Each vessel as it arrives is taken up almost immediately to convey back the
majority of its passengers; the remainder take a turn up to the diggings, but finding
nothing doing, return only to hurry away from the desolate scene that surrounds them.
My own impression is that another month will wind up the settlement, and by that time
there will be some two or three hundred persons left, of whom perhaps one hundred may
be in Rockhampton, and the remainder obtaining a precarious yield of gold from
Canoona and its neighbourhood.
On the diggings the same stats of thing, prevail. Only very few persons are at work, and
they are men who are forced to keep on in order to provide themselves with rations -- a
few shillings a day being all they can earn with hard work.
We have had a few days of wet weather, and there is reason to think that the rain has been
much heavier in the interior, so that the fresh in the river is likely to continue for some
time longer. But for the boats at the crossing place all communication between here and
the diggings would be cut off.
There was a report current last night, that a vessel had been wrecked that morning in
Keppel Bay, but we have had no communication thence since Saturday morning. The
wind during yesterday, was blowing a fearful gale, with heavy squalls of rain, and some
such an accident had been anticipated.