HIS SPEECHES.
159
the usual sources of revenue for a Government you cannot expect to pay dividends. The people would get annoyed if you did; they do not like to see licences spent in dividends—those are assets which are to pay for any public works and for good government. We must therefore look to our minerals to give us a return on our capital, which you must remember is £2,000,000.
“In dealing with that question, I will ask, What have you got? You possess a country about one thousand two hundred miles by five hundred which is mineralised, and as regards the efforts which have at present been made, you have in connection with the search for minerals forty thousand claims registered with the Government of the country. That means two thousand miles of mineralised quartz, and I would refer you to the report of Mr. Hammond, who went through the country with me, and who is the consulting engineer of the Goldfields of South Africa Company. He was highly pleased with what he saw. There was a suggestion made that the reefs were not true fissure veins; did not go down. He pooh-poohed that idea. I would refer you to page 35 of the directors’ report, where he alludes to that, and says: ‘Veins of this class are universally noted for their permanency.’ Then if you follow his remarks on the mineral position, you will find that he says: ‘It would be an anomaly in the history of gold-mining if, upon the hundreds of miles of mineralised veins, valuable ore-shoots should not be developed as the result of future work.’ He adds: ‘There are, I think, substantial grounds to predict the opening up of shoots of ore from which an important mining industry will ultimately be developed.’ Then he warns people about the mode of investing money in the search for minerals,