Page:The Boy Travellers in Australasia.djvu/238

214 Doctor Bronson had a letter of introduction to a gentleman interested in one of the largest mines, and the trio of travellers were at once made welcome. Clad in appropriate costumes, they were taken into the mine, where they walked a long distance through a tunnel, and were then conducted through a perfect maze of shafts and levels, where the workmen were busily occupied in removing the auriferous rock, which was carried directly to the reduction-works, where it was crushed and the precious metal extracted. The gold contains a large amount—thirty per cent.—of silver, and consequently has an appearance of pallor when turned out from the retorts. As the work of gold-mining has been described elsewhere in the wanderings of the boy travellers, it is hardly necessary to give it here, the processes of mining and reduction being practically the same all over the world.



Frank and Fred obtained the following information relative to gold-mining in New Zealand, and especially in the region now under consideration:

"Gold-mining in New Zealand properly dates from 1861, when gold was discovered by Mr. Gabriel Read at Tuapeka, in the province of Otago. The existence of the precious metal was known nine or ten