A VISIT TO THE WESTERN GOLDFIELDS.
BY OUR SPECIAL REPORTER
No. 26.
Once again to the Pyramul. Three minor ranges diverge from the Bogie table mountain,
in which many small streams have their source, and have enriched this neighbourhood.
There is a large extent of auriferous ground either not prospected, or only partially
worked by wandering parties. Two public houses and three small stores are more than
sufficient to supply the wants of a community not exceeding sixty in number, including
men, women, and children. Of the two latter there is a fair proportion, but there is neither
church, school, nor any other evidence of a thriving settlement. From a long hill we
descend into a picturesque valley; here the sloping sides of the mountains on either hand
give birth to many small streams, all auriferous, which unite and form the head waters of
Long Creek.
This creek has been celebrated for the large quantity of gold found in its channel, and for
the richness of the ground in its neighbourhood, only a very small portion of which has
been yet worked. Unlike the generality of auriferous streams, it has been most productive
near its source, and the digger has followed the gold up the mountain side, even beyond
the lost indication of a watercourse, proceeding along the margin of the stream, which in
dry weather is little better than a succession of waterholes. Although extensively worked
and turned over, you arrive at a long flat, silted up to a great depth, which is said to
contain large deposits of gold, out of which water renders it difficult to work on a small
scale.
Following the stream a quarter of a mile further, you arrive at the falls, the ridges and
banks on both sides of which are extensive, and in places have been found to be very
productive. Some lucky hits have also been made amongst the rocks, which, descending
about 200 feet, at an angle of 45 degrees, over detached boulders, present many spots
favourable to the detention of heavy nuggets. Nothing would be easier to a party of seven
or eight men, than to open the deep flat, and carry the drainage over the falls. One party
of these men procured between 60 and 70 ounces here during a few weeks of dry weather,
but found that unless the whole was drained even that would not pay, as the debris is too
loose for tunnelling, and must be removed to the depth of 20 or 25 feet out of a face,
working up from the falls. The diggings here are patchy and irregular, the miners either
getting nothing, or enough in a few days to repay them for many months' labour; little
fortunes have been taken out of holes in this neighbourhood not larger than a sugar
hogshead. Persons having a considerable amount of mining experience, who understand
this ground, and have known it for years, are of the opinion that it is one of the best fields
in the district for the enterprise of a few energetic men, having the means of support for
two or three months; -- it intersects the line of quartz reefs passing through the Dog-trap
ranges, which have always proved to be rich where the ground was favourable for
alluvial deposits.
Retracing your steps to the road near the flat, it conducts you over three or four
descending ridges to a point where the stream forms a junction with what is known as the
left-hand branch, coming from the direction of Campbell's Creek: this is also auriferous,
has been little worked, and the upper portion is unknown. All the depressions between the
ridges here contain coarse gold. Some have been worked with great success; others are as
yet undisturbed. Following the creek for two miles, along banks much cut up, and a
channel rooted and turned over until the whole looks like an exhausted brickfield, you
pass a cluster of comfortable though rough-looking cottages; the soil is too sterile and has
been too valuable for gardens, and yet there is an at-homish aspect about the place, with
its well-stocked store and butchering establishment, and a sort of well-to-do look about
everybody you meet, that tells of good claims not far distant. As you progress you find
the hills close in on either side. You are now deep in the schists, and the outburst of a line
of trappean rocks appears at various points in the flanking ranges, which seem to have
been exposed by the disintegration of the contorted schists, and here and there a dyke of
an intensely hard granitic rock, vesicular and sonorous as a bell, may be seen crossing the
channel of the stream in a diagonal line, looking as fresh and sharp if as it was in a state
of fusion yesterday, and had only just cooled down; and accumulations of quartz, the
debris of destroyed veins and reefs, become abundant, and narrow glaring white slips of
barren flats border the creek, and these flats are covered with diggers to the extent of a
mile up and down the stream -- Chinese and Europeans, alike active, busy, and
prosperous.
Still pursuing your course down stream, you reach Jackson's Flat; this is of the same
description as that just noticed, except that it is more extensive, the ranges recede, and
gentle declivities subside into the low ground. Here about fifty men are employed, all
making a subsistence, and a few earning from £4 to £6 week each. You are again on the
line of the Dog-trap reefs. One party of three or four working on a puddling machine,
were particularly fortunate, having obtained £240 worth of gold in three washings; I saw
a nugget little short of 12 ounces taken by them the evening before my visit, and since
that period I am informed that a sum exceeding £200 has been the result of one week's
work. There is a post-office here and a public-house, and an air of comfort and prosperity
surrounds the diggers'dwellings, although the soil is unsuitable for agriculture.
These diggings differ from all others tributary to the Meroo, inasmuch as they lay higher,
the gradual descent is steeper, and there is no under-current to contend with; in fact, want
of water in a dry season is the greatest difficulty that they have to encounter. I may add
that the deposit resting upon the bed rock is more calcareous and compact, sometimes
forming a hard conglomerate from the debris of the ancient limestone formation. Mining
operations are now chiefly carried on in the marginal flats, the bed of the stream having
been long since exhausted.