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Revenue. —The following has been collected during the year: Tuapeka District —Gold fields revenue, £904 3s. 6d.; rent on mining leases, £175 16s. 3d.; agricultural leases, £1,544 15s. lOd.; deferred payment leases and licenses, £3,430 Bs.; depasturing allotments, £444 Bs. 6d. ; fees and fines in Warden's Court, £82 Is.; fees and fines in Resident Magistrate's Court, £195 155.: total, £6,777 Bs. Id. Waikaia District, from all sources : £690 6s. 9d. Judicial. —The number of cases disposed of during the year is as follows: Tuapeka District— Warden's Court: Cases, 75; mining applications, 153. Resident Magistrate's Court: Civil cases, 256 ; criminal cases, 157 ; other cases and applications, 88. Waikaia District: Warden's Court, 8 cases ; Resident Magistrate's Court, 65 cases. Special Report.- —The Gabriel's Gully Company occupy a special claim of 24 acres,extending down the course of the gully from opposite the Blue Spur. This ground was worked in the early days of the gold field, but it is said in an imperfect manner, and it is now all covered to a considerable depth with tailings discharged from the Blue Spur claims. The object of the company is to work the tailings and the old ground left in the gully The difficulties that prevent this being done by sluicing in the ordinary way are: w-ant of sufficient fall, and the fact that mixed through the tailings are fragments of cement of various sizes, containing a large proportionate quantity of gold, which would not become sufficiently disintegrated by ordinary sluicing to liberate the gold contained therein. To meet these difficulties the company has adopted a mode of working which, although the principle is not entirely new, has not, I believe, been applied before to an undertaking of a like description. The works consist of a drainage race, pipes fo lead head-water, an elevating pipe, and sluice-boxes. The drainage race is made of sheet-iron, forming a pipe 30 inches in diameter. At the lower end of the race this pipe is laid on the surface of the tailings, and it is extended up the gully through a channel opened in the tailings, with just sufficient inclination to allow water to drain down the gully This pipe is continued for a distance of 1,500 feet up the claim, and is at that point a considerable depth from the surface of the tailings and two or three feet into the bed rock. By means of this race the object sought for— thorough drainage —is effectually secured, and the race can be now extended as the workings advance up the gully by simply cutting a channel in the rock, the distance and depth required, and covering it with suitable material. Near the present head of the drainage race operations at sluicing the ground have been commenced. A large open space was first made down to the rock bottom, and the elevating apparatus placed in position. This consists of a double pipe 15 inches in diameter, made of sheet-iron, joined with a half circular cast-iron elbow of larger diameter than the pipe, and perforated at the angle with an aperture of 12 or 14 inches diameter. The elbow is placed in a hollow, or shallow well-hole, in the rock, and the ends rise nearly perpendicular 12 or 15 feet above the surface of the tailings. One end of this pipe is joined to another pipe of the same diameter, which conveys water from a supply dam situate at an elevation of 294 feet, thus affording great pressure. The other end of the pipe is made to discharge into the head of a long line of sluice-boxes supported on tressels over the bed of the gully When water is let in from the supply dam it passes down through the water-pipe, and then rushes up the elevating pipe, drawing, as it does so, through the aperture in the elbow all gravel, cement, earth, or water within reach. With a sufficient supply of water the process seems capable of lifting an enormous quantity of stuff, and it is projected up the pipe with immense velocity, estimated at a mile a minute, by which means all unbroken lumps of cement strike a thick plate of iron placed for that purpose at the top of the pipe, and, by force of the blow, become pulverized. Everything reaching the head of the pipe then flows through an aperture into the sluice-boxes, which, being raised as I have explained, can be so arranged as to discharge debris at any locality or distance, as occasion may require. Another appliance is a line of 15-inch piping, about 3,000 feet in length, which conveys water from a lagoon at the head of the gully to near the face of the workings. The pipe is there fitted with a patent nozzle, with which the water is played upon the face, sides, and bottom of the workings, and forces the earth and tailings in large quantities towards the aperture in the elbow of the elevating pipe, from whence all is drawn up the pipe and deposited in the sluice-boxes. When the claim is properly opened out, and the process complete, the gravel and earth will be first elevated on to a platform by means of buckets travelling on a band, worked by a turbine wheel, and be there discharged on to a-grating for the purpose of separating all large stones; these will fall on to a travelling chain-belt, and be deposited in any convenient spot out of the way of the workings. The fine stuff will fall through the grating on to a hopper at the base of the elevating pipe, be drawn through the aperture, and lifted a further 20 to 40 feet as may be necessary, to afford sufficient space for deposit of debris from the sluice-boxes. I have, &c, E. H. Caeew, The Under-Secretary for Gold Fields, Wellington. Warden.
No. 16. Mr. Warden Maitland to the Under-Secretary for Gold Fields. Sie, — Warden's Office, Dunedin, 22nd April, 1881. I have the honor to enclose herewith the annual returns of information relating to the state and condition of the Hindon Mining District, for the year ending 31st March, 188L. These returns do not exhibit much change in the slate of the district since the last annual report; but, upon the whole, it will be seen that mining operations have slightly increased. The number of miners is greater than during the previous year, the increase being in the alluvial workings. Alluvial Mining. —In Styles's, Fraser's, Game Hen, and other Gullies, several parties have taken up extended claims, ordinary claims not being of sufficient extent to compensate miners for the amount of labour requisite in the cutting of tail-races to their respective holdings. Some of these parties have excellent prospects of remunerative employment for a long time to come. I may mention that one party, having spent nearly eight months in cutting their tail-race, recouped themselves for all their outlay from the washing-up of the first paddock. The gold in these gullies is unusually coarse, and of quality; the wash-dirt, in patches, being very rich. In many places it is found that the
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