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may be mentioned that the Imperial Company had itself been preceded by two other companies, the Alhambra and the Rose of Lancaster, in the ownership of the claim. From the bottom of the shaft referred to a level was driven north for a considerable distance. This level served the Just-in-Time Company to work its eastern shoot to a depth corresponding nearly with the 450 ft. level of the Fiery Cross shaft. The Reform, or Imperial, shoot was not, however, traced down to it. About 1896 the Consolidated Goldfields Company deepened the shaft to 400 ft. and prospected from it at that depth for the shoot without success. In 1910 another company repaired the shaft, and did some further prospecting both on the 200 ft. and 400 ft. levels, but having no better fortune than its predecessors it soon went into liquidation.
The total ore crushed from the claim amounted to 1,672 tons, which yielded 1,072 oz. gold, approximate value £4,133 10s. The greater portion of this stone seems to have come from quite close to the surface.
South Hopeful Mine.—This claim was next south to the Reform. A company was formed in 1877 to work it, and an adit was driven south for 600 ft. without meeting any stone. In 1887, however, some quartz was found a few feet to one side of the old adit and 30 ft. in from the portal. On this a winze was sunk for some distance, but the stone turned out to be narrow and very broken. There is no record of any crushing from the mine.
Lone Star Mine.—This mine was some distance south of the South Hopeful, and separated from it by claims known as the Chicago, Multum in Parvo, and Orient. It was the most southerly in which auriferous quartz was got on Topfer’s lode-series. There were two outcrops of reef on the claim, about 350 ft. apart. On the northern outcrop a winze was sunk to 67 ft. on reef, at which depth a level driven on the shoot proved it to be 160 ft. in length, with an average width of 1 ft. 6 in., but it was badly broken. An adit was then driven to cut the reef 103 ft. below the drive just mentioned, or 170 ft. below the outcrop, but in this no trace of the shoot was met with. The southern outcrop was about 200 ft. long on the surface, and a trial crushing of 20 tons taken from it is reported to have yielded 35 dwt. gold per ton. Two adits were driven, however, in search of the shoot without locating any solid reef. Some small parcels of stone, totalling 220 tons, chiefly from the north outcrop, were treated for a yield of 75 oz. gold, which was not payable.
Eureka Mine.—Though no reef was at any time found in this claim it adjoined the Fiery Cross, Hopeful, and Welcome Claims on the east, and, as the very extensive prospecting-work carried out in it had for its main objective the location at depth of the Welcome shoot, it may be deemed as being on Topfer’s line. During the number of years mining operations were in progress on it various owners controlled the property. The first company, formed in 1883, sank an incline at a grade of one in three for a distance of 1,800 ft., and from the foot of this extended a level north 600 ft., at a cost of £18,000. In 1892 the claim was amalgamated with the Welcome and Homeward Bound, and thereafter for about five years practically all the prospecting-work being done on the lode-series was directed from it. The operations carried out from it by the Welcome United Company have already been described and need not be recapitulated. It will suffice to say that they were not successful in achieving their purpose. Afterwards, when the claim passed into the hands of the Consolidated Goldfields of New Zealand, that company continued the sinking of the “monkey” shaft to 533 ft., and opened out a level at that depth, from which much prospecting was done with equally satisfactory results.
