The Sun.
London, England, 1853-03-09 00:00:00

AUSTRALIAN GOLD FIELDS.

The Ceylon Times of the 18th Jan., which has
come to hand this morning, contains the following
interesting particulars, copied from the Maitland
Mercury, respecting the state and prospects of
some of the northern gold fields :
We have been obliged with information by a
perfectly reliable party, which appears to us to settle
the doubts as to the character of the Bingera gold
field, so far as it has yet been proved.
Some seven weeks since a practised Turon and
Tambaroura digger, a resident of Maitland, was
induced by the exciting accounts of the success of
the Bingera field, which reached Maitland from
Sydney, to proceed to Bingera himself, to see
whether it would be worth while to take a claim
and work. He went by way of the Hanging Rock
diggings. When he reached Bingera, he found
that out of some 200 persons scattered about, there
were about a dozen or more parties, eaeh of three,
four, or five men, who were making from two to
four ounces per day, but that the others were doing
little or nothing ; great numbers arrived every day
during his stay, and about as many left every day
disappointed. He found on inquiry, and on work-
ing himself, that the productive ground was con-
fined to a very small space on the forest land, and
was even there purely surface diggings, the gold
commencing among the very roots of the grass,
and in most of the good claims extending not
deeper than nine inches in profitable quantity, and
in none of the claims going lower than three feet
from the surface ; the most profitable of all, the
Blacksmith's Claim, which lay in a kind of shallow
gully, ceasing at three feet. All round the limited
rich ground were holes sunk and being worked,
many by thoroughly practised hands, and they
yielded very little, not above 15 grains of gold per
day, and as carting the stuff to water cost 4s. per
load, none of the parties were working to
profit except those on the small isolated spot
of rich ground. Numbers of persons were
out prospecting all round, many of whom told
our informant that they had run the creeks down
to the Big River, and had prospected on the Big
River itself, finding gold in small specks every-
where they tried, but in such minute quantities
that it was not profitable to work. Our informant
himself ran down one of the creeks six miles, and
his trials yielded precisely the same result, gold
everywhere, more or less, but in too small a quan-
tity to be profitable ; in one case our inform-
ant washed out some stuff from off the bed rock,
a hole having been sunk 18 feet to it, and he did
not get a speck of gold. The conclusion on his own
mind, after five days' thorough inquiry and ex-
amination, was that the country presented every
appearance of being auriferous ; that the productive
part yet found must very shortly be worked out
and abandoned • that up to that time, rather more
than a fortnight ago, no other productive place
than the original small one had been found ; that
its yield had been greatly exaggerated by report ;
and that prospecting for further rich spots could
only be well prosecuted by parties from the imme-
diate neighbourhood, who could take advantage of
transient rains to wash the trial stuff in many dif-
ferent places. He does not doubt the possibility of
other rich spots being found, or even that eventually
profitable winter diggings may be discovered in the
neighbourhood, but he is not at all satisfied that
they will be found, thinking it quite a matter of
doubt.

But our informant has formed a very different
conclusion as to the Hanging Rock diggings. He
found about the Hanging Rock creeks that many
parties were doing well, one party having obtained
27 ounces in a day ; and that on the Peel diggings,
on the A. A. Company's estate, say eight miles from
the Hanging Rock, the diggings were very rich and
profitable. The disputes as to the right, or rather
power of the A. A. Company to prevent by force
diggers from working these alluvial diggings, pre-
vented our informant from seeking to work there,
but he saw several places in the neighbourhood of
the Hanging Rock where he would willingly have
obtained claims and worked, had it not been that
the abundance of water prevented the hope of pro-
fitable working for some time. Great numbers of
the disappointed Bingera, diggers came back by
way of the Hanging Rock, as did our informant ;
and very many of them immediately set to work,
the greater part going to the Peel diggings on the
A. A. Company's land. Our informant satisfied
himself, by personal examination, of the great
richness of these diggings, and of the immense
wealth apparently contained in the celebrated
quartz ridge on the land, the gold in the quartz
being universally diffused, and quite plain to the
eye, and in his opinion the immediate banks and
bed of the Peel itself, in that neighbourhood, will
prove very rich in gold when tie water has les-
sened. But even supposing the company succeed
in preventing diggers from working the alluvial
diggings on their estates, the neighbourhood of the
Hanging Rock affords so many profitable spots that
great quantities of gold will be produced at these
diggings during the ensuing summer.

INTERESTING TO NAVIGATORS.-THE
FALKLAND ISLANDS.

Under this head we find in a recent number of the
New York Express the following remarks, in reference
to the Falkland Islands, now attracting so much atten-
tion in this country, because of their exceeding eligibi-
lity for purposes of transportation, when the dispatch of
convicts to Australia shall cease. The importance of
these islands to Great Britain, in a commerciaLsense, is
strengthened from the fact of the rapidly increasing
number of Australian vessels coming home by way of
Cape Horn ; and, we believe, it is the intention of the
proprietors of some of our great lines of steamers to
establish a coal depot there, in which case there will
necessarily be a vast augmentation to the advan-
tages already specified by our American contempo
rary, namely—" For the interest of American and other
shipowners, whalers, and all other vessels, it cannot be too
generally made known that the Falkland Islands, off the
coast of South America, now afford an excellent station,
with many good and safe harbours, at which vessels of
every class may find supplies. Ships proceeding to or
from the East Indies, China, or from the Pacific coast
and Polynesia, round the Cape of Good Hope orCape Horn,
will find, at the Falkland Islands, the means, in ordi-
nary cases of damage, of repair, supplies of provisions,
&c., in short, all such stores as are required by merchant
vessels. There, there are no port or Custom-house
charges, whereas, at all the South American continental
ports, whether in Brazil or on the River Plate, the
charges are very high, delays and vexations frequent,
and labour and articles required for repairs exorbitant.
But the most serious objection to the Brazilian ports is
the prevalence of a malignant yellow fever, particularly
dangerous to the ships' companies, on board vessels in
the harbours. From these reasons, as well as from the
conveniences and facilities afforded by the authorities,
and by the new settlements at these islands, the number
of vessels touching there has been very much increased,
and will, no doubt, continue to increase in every suc-
ceeding year."

RAILWAY SHARE MARKETS.

LIVERPOOL—MARca 8.

flat, S T
andOC K
scarcely F ',/c o eNs on
yE
business mwa market et
transacted.
et
imo veryns.
were as follows :—Dublin and Belfast Junction, 1 . ,
Caledonian 31i ; East Lancashire, 18g c. ; Lancashire and
Yorkshire, '774 ; London and North Western, 1181 ;
land, 76 6, A-, 6 ; North British, 9 ; South Eastern and
Dover, 234, ; York and North Midland, 294 ; Black-
burn, 6 per cent., 27a ; East Lancashire Fifth Shares, B p.;
Midland (Leicester and Swan.), 198.
MANCHESTER—MARcH $.
STOCK .KXCIIANOEThe business was firm to-day, and
prices wero somewhat better at the close than at the com-
mencement. The sales to-day were :—Dundalk and Ennis-
killen, 15s ex div. ; Eastern Counties, 13 ex thy. ; East
Lancashire, div. ; Lancashire and Yorkshire, 774,
A, 7, 4;_ ditto Fifths, dis. • London and North West-
tnecichedisrteve.rre!retsluihteeteofft, Me9l.d.iaGniat.)lnreßdra..(piaimiQcioulaninairtieß):ali2ll79v-11y6;
pernm,nl.l;B
6 ex
South-Eastern, 234, 3-16, 3-16,
CdLiotsnl776llCs. , e7w64,6

appointed
BIRMINGHAM MARC g
STOCK EXCHANGE.—The uncertainu
bills now before Parliament operatesinius-Ple of railway
Railway Share Market. Once the coinmnilB,l,,Y uPon the
under the auspices of Mr. Henley has reported,
port what it may, there will be a decided movmilintth;e kruei
done on
until the question of amalgamation is settled
'ment there appears to be little probability of any material
change in railway matters. There nothing
'Change to-day, and no material variation in prices.