The Sun.
London, England, 1858-04-03 00:00:00

AUSTRALIA.

The following are further extracts from the
Australian papers received yesterday :

(firm the Melbourne Herald.)
THE GOLD FIELDS.

Since the date of our last summary, the following
escorts have arrived :

ESCORT RETURNS, 1853.
Week ended Jan. 23
Do. Jan. 30
Do. Feb. G
Do. Feb. 13

oz. dwl
.. 42,682 5
.. 36.661 15
.. 45,578 10
.. 34,169 10

Total 159,092 0
During the same period the following quantities
of gold have been shipped :
GOLD SHIPMENTS, 1858.

Week ended Jan. 23 , 55,033
Do. Jan. 30
Do. Feb. 6
Do- Feb. 13

Total

This falling off is principally attributable to the
unusual dryness of the present season, which pre-
vents the diggers from washing their gold, and it is
by no means improbable that this temporary de-
ficiency may have a good effect by compelling the
governments and the people to do something to
provide the diggings with a proper supply of water.
Hitherto public enterprise has been principally con-
fined to building hotels and stores on the gold-
fields townships, and although the diggers are by
no means—even in the localities longest worked-,--
well housed, empty shops are not unusual on the
gold-fields. The question of water supply is a most
vital one, nor do there seem any insurmountable
obstacles in the way accomplishing this most de-
sirable object. Every one of the gold-fields is neat
permanent and abundant water, and a very small
amount of exertion would suffice to bring it to the
doors of the diggers. Unless something of this
kind be done, and promptly too, every dry season
will bring with it a diminished yield of gold, and all
the other evils which so untoward a state of things
is likely to entail.

No large rush has taken place since Ararat, the
searcity of water to which we have before alluded
having effectually prevented prospecting. Some
minor rushes have, however, taken place in the
Maryborough district, at one of which (Havelock
flat) a population of five or six thousand persons
are now located.

The immense number of fields now being worked,
and the enormous extent of country which they
occupy, is the best guarantee for their permanency.
They reach from Pleasant Creek in the Grampians
to Omeo in the Australian Alps, a distance of three
hundred miles, by an average width from north to
south of fifty miles. They are divided into six
great divisions, Ballaarat, Castlemaine, Sandhurst,
Avoca, Beechworth, and Ararat ; and each of these
comprises several fields ; thus the Ballarat divi-
sion contains the gold fields Ballaarat, Buninyong,
Smythe Creek, Linton's, Carngham, Brown's,
Creswick Creek, Mount Egerton, Mount Black-
wood, and Steightz. Castlemaine, Foreet, Barker's,
Fryer's, and Campbell's Creeks; Tarradale, Mount
Franklin, Wombat, Tarrengower, and Kangaroo,
Sandhurst ; Bendigo, which itself occupies at least
a hundred square miles of auriferous ground,
Heathcote, Ruslrworth, and Whroo. Avoca :
Avoca, Maryborough, Alma, Daisy Hill, Dunolly,
Moliagul, Macintyre's, Cochrane's, Sandy, Jones,
and Cunt Creeks ; Koroug, New Bendigo, an d
Kingower. Beechworth : the diggings near the
township, Nine Mile, Yackandanah, the Woolshed,
and Omeo. Ararat : Ararat, Pleasant Creek, and
Fiery Creek.