THE TEANSVAAL GOLDFIELDS.

Inangahua Times, Volume VIII, Issue 1294, 7 September 1883, Page 2

THE TEANSVAAL GOLDFIELDS.

The last mail from South Africa brings intelligence ' of a very satisfactory character from the goldfields now being opened tap in the Transvaal. Various reports of the richness of the deposits in the neighbourhood of Lydeuburg have been received from time to time, notwithstanding efforts on the part of those who were first in the field, and endeavouring to obtain " concessions" to keep the facts secret. There are now, however, several mining engineers in the district surveying on the part of capitalists in Cape Town and elsewhere, and several of the newspapers have sent special correspondents to the " fields," who concur in giving the most satisfactory accounts of the quantities of gold lying ready to be worked. In many cases the precious metal lies close to the surface, the loose soil requiring only to be dug up and worked. In others rich quartzveins extend in an unbroked line for two to three miles. On a slope of the Spitzkop Farm two claims which have quietly worked for the past 12 months have yielded £6000 worth of gold ; and the prospectors state that the deeper they go the richer the ground becomes. There is no hard quartz to break, the reef having become " rotten," or disintegrated by the action of the weather. Nuggete of 20oz and 80oz in weight have been picked up in the "rubbish." Two diggers actually threw away lumps of quartz, which they have not J the necessary appliances for ciushing, but which have been proved to contain 4oz of gold to the ton. In consequence of these and similar facts, shares in "claims" owned by Cape Town adventures have risen in value from £24 to £50 each. At another claim adjoining a month's " wash-up" produced 4200z of gold, worth £1470. At a third claim, known as " Grwynne Owen's concession" on the waterfall property, the ground is even richer, there being large deposits of alluvial soil, consisting in some places of nearly half pure gold. On Berlin, Lisbon, and Herinansburgh farms old Portuguese workings, forgotten for centuries, have been discovered, partly buried beneath overgrowing vegetation, but intersected with " rotten reefs," yielding from soz to 20oz of gold per ton. It would seem probable that these workings were abandoned from the same cause which has driven the recent explorers back from the country farther north, in Matabele land and Eersteling fields — viz., the hostility of the natives, who prevented several parties from taking away specimens of gold. When proper machinery is erected on these new i goldfields their value will be increased many times, the diggers at presentemployed there being satisfied to use merely the pick and 'shovel, and to wash the '.' stuff' in rude appliances through which a large quantity of gold is lost. In one case a correspondent of the Friend of the Free State reports that " quartz is thrown away when actually gold is discernible to the naked eye." — London Times. ■..-•;