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getting a fairer average of the wind, but its removal might be at any time easily effected could a better site be conveniently granted.

Proximity to the office is the only recommendation of the present one.

I have the honor to be,

Sir,
Your most obedient Servant,

JAMES HECTOR,
Provincial Geologist.

GOLD FIELDS.

To His Honor Major Richardson,
Superintendent.

REPORT

On the Progress, Condition, and Prospects of the Gold Fields of Otago.

BEFORE proceeding to the consideration of the present condition and future prospects of the Otago Gold-Fields, I desire to invite attention to a brief retrospect of the earlier discoveries. The facts which I have to detail in connection therewith may not possess the attraction of novelty; but it seems desirable that the principal circumstances relating to this branch of the History of the Province should be embodied in an Official Report for future reference. With this object in view, I have collected materials from every available source. And here I wish to record my obligations to the Chief Surveyor, who kindly placed at my disposal much interesting information, and otherwise rendered valuable assistance in the compilation of my Report.

It is difficult to say positively when, or by whom, gold was first discovered in Otago. That the Maories were aware of its existence before the arrival of the European colonists is an undoubted fact. I have been informed by Mr. Palmer, of Moeraki Bush, that many years prior to the settlement of the Province, he was assured by the Native Chief Tuawaiki that "plenty ferro," or yellow stone, such as that of which the seals of the white men were made, could be obtained in the interior of the island, and the country of the Upper Molyneux, or Clutha River, was particularly indicated as a gold bearing locality.

At a later period, other natives confirmed these statements; and at least one party of settlers attempted to discover the El Dorado, asserted to exist. Mr. Thomas B. Archibald, of the Pomahaka, has kindly favored me with a letter, from which I make the following extract respecting this expedition, in which that gentleman was himself an active agent:—

"Nearly all the Maori residents at the Molyneux at the time of our excursion were strangers, having been only a few years in the place. There were only a man and woman who knew the country between the mouth of the River and the Lakes. The man, Raki Raki, had resided on the Wakatipu Lake, but had left many years ago. He left a brother, who had two wives, behind; and who, he said, were the only Maories in the interior. He told me he once picked up a piece of "simon" (gold) about the size of a small potato on the banks of the Molyneux, but did not know its value, and he threw it into the river. They told us they had seen the small "simon" on the sides of the river, where three canoes had been lying. On seeing a small sample of gold (which, I think, Mr. Meredith brought down from Tasmania, about the beginning of 1852) the natives were the more convinced we should find it in the sands of the Molyneux. As some of us were on the eve of starting for Australia, we thought we would give the River a trial first, more especially as we had the services of a Californian miner, who had left a whaling vessel in the Bay. We made a party of five and started up the River in March, 1852, in a whale boat which I brought from Dunedin. We prospected the bars and banks of the river, as far as a creek now named the Beaumont. As none of us knew anything about gold-seeking, except the American, and getting nothing more than the colour, we resolved to return, after having nearly a three weeks’ cruise; the more so, as the river seemed a succession of rapids, which it was difficult to get the boat through. If our Californian miner had been the practical hand he represented himself to be, I have no doubt we would have been successful at least in getting a good prospect."

Dated "Pomahaka, 29th Sept., 1862."

Gold was also found in various parts of the Province by the settlers themselves, but the fact was either suppressed, as likely to produce mischievous results, or neglected, as of trivial import. I have been shown a small quantity of fine, scaly gold, which was procured in 1853, in the neighbourhood of the remarkable chert rocks known as the Fortifications.

The first official intimation of the discovery of auriferous deposits in Otago appears to have emanated from Mr. C. W. Ligar, formerly Surveyor-General of New Zealand, and who now holds the same office in the colony of Victoria. A letter written by that gentleman in 1856 to the then Superintendent—Captain Cargill—contains the following passage:—