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in question comprises an area of 135 acres, for which the owner wants £800, and that the directors wish to wind up the company. There is a good plant-on the ground, with a fair supply of water, having a head of about 800 ft. There is little doubt but this plant will yet be utilised to better advantage than it has heretofore been. Hercules Company. —This company worked some very good ground when it first commenced sluicing operations, but of recent years the yield of gold has not been large, and last year the results of the working did not cover the expenditure. A cut has been taken back into the flat for the purpose of testing where another good run of auriferous drift would be found, but without success. It is said that, from the experience now gained regarding the lead of gold on this flat, the original course of the river came for only a short distance into the flat, and then swept off again to the other side of the valley, about 10 chains below where the best of the gold was found. It is a great pity that success has not attended this company's operations, as it holds the first rights of water from the Teviot Eiver, from which there is a constant supply. This portion of the property will be valuable, as by extending the water-race it will command any ground on either side of the river in this valley with a head that can be utilised for either motive-power to work dredges or for carrying on hydraulic sluicing and elevating operations. It has been mooted that there is a probability of this water-supply being purchased, if the company abandon the present ground, and to extend the race along the side of the range, carrying a siphon across the Clutha Eiver to work ground near the Dumbarton Eock, which is supposed to be the place where the river had at one time left the present bed and flowed close along the foot of the range, coming into its present course again near the mouth of the Bengerburn Creek. At all events, be this as it may, there is comparatively little gold in the bed of the present course of the river between these points. Dredging operations have not proved such a success as elsewhere on the river. Enterprise Company. —This company has recently acquired the mining claim and water-race known as Milne and party, Dismal Swamp, who have enlarged the race so as to give it a carryingcapacity of twenty heads of water, it being 3ft. 6in. wide in bottom by 18in. deep, with good fall. The water for this race is taken out of the left branch of the Teviot Eiver, and the distance the race is constructed is about six miles. This company has a special claim of 50 acres, portion of which has been proved payable for working by the ordinary method of ground sluicing. The ground where the operations are commenced is about 15ft. deep, but the surface rises as it goes back, while the bottom is slightly dipping. It is intended to work it on the hydraulic elevating system, and a main line of pipes has been laid down from the end of the water-race for a distance of about 40 chains. The pipes are 22in. at the intake end, and are reduced to 18in. and 13in. respectively; the total head that these give at the workings is about 100 ft. The sluices are 3ft. in width and about 130 ft. in length, fitted up partly with angle-iron ripples and partly with perforated plates having cocoanut-matting laid under these. Roxburgh Amalgamated Company. —This company has met with success in carrying on sluicing operations during the past year. The ground that has been worked, although not rich, has yielded a sufficient quantity of gold to return good interest on the capital invested. The value of the gold obtained during the last year, as taken from the company's balance, was £8,848 16s. 2d., as against £5,420 Is. 7d. for the previous year. The expenditure for the year, being £4,058 6s. 2d., shows a profit on the year's transactions of £4,790 10s., as against a profit of £1,772 18s. 6d. for the previous year. This means that gold to the value of £3,428 14s. 7d. was obtained last year in excess of what was got for the previous one, while the increased expenditure was only about £410. During the year the sum of £167 3s. 9d. was expended in providing new plant, and £250 had been placed to a reserve fund, while five dividends of 6d. per share had been paid, being equal to 12J per cent, on the capital of the company. This shows that mining investments, when properly managed, are equal to any commercial venture. This company attributes the success attending their operations last year to the improved value of the ground, and the uninterrupted supply of water it had, owing to having raised the wall of the weir placed at the upper end of the gorge of the Teviot Eiver about 6ft., and thus conserving the water in the Dismal Swamp. This site for a large reservoir has been referred to in my previous reports as one of the best sites for the conservation of a large body of water there is in the colony, at a minimum expense— the Dismal Swamp being a large flat at the head of a deep narrow rocky gorge. Were it not for the additional conservation of water which was in this dam last year, owing to it being raised, this company would have been short of water at a time when the dry weather gives greater facilities for working. The capacity of this dam can yet be increased more than twice what it is at present, and this would give a supply of water for other companies or parties of miners to work new ground. The great trouble is, however, in arranging with the different persons who have water-rights from the same stream to allow any of the water from the dam to pass to others than those who have at the present acquired water-rights from the Teviot Eiver. Bald Rill Flat. A number of claims have been taken up on this flat in recent years, and some very good returns have been obtained. The Last Chance Company have had two partial washings-up from their paddock, which gave a return of 109oz. gold, and they expect, when the whole of it is washed up, they will have about 2500z. for the season's work. The Bald Hill Sluicing Company have also, it is said, done very well this season, and are now repairing their races for a fresh start in the spring. Wilkinson and Corrall's season's work is also said to have given very satisfactory results. Not only is there good sluicing ground on this flat, but the whole of the slopes of the Old Man Eange directly above this flat, and for a considerable distance up towards Clyde, or wherever there are alluvial drifts, contain gold. The gold found in Bald Hill Mat, Butcher's, and Conroy's Gullies is derived from a concentration of the material from this range, and some very rich claims were worked in the beds of those gullies in the early days, and on the face of the range directly above Bald Hill Plat. Mr.