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Title
Half hundred-weight of gold
Description

Excitement in Melbourne reached an all-time high when reports of a party of diggers with a half-hundred weight of gold arrived in the city, only to be topped several hours later by an even larger find.

Date
29 September 1851
Published Source
Australian National Dictionary Centre, The Gold Rushes and Australian English: a resource for researchers, teachers and students, Australian National University, 2005, http://www.anu.edu.au/andc/res/aus_words/gold/index.php. Details
Rights
This material is provided by the Australian National Dictionary Centre, a joint project of the Australian National University and Oxford University Press Australia.

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Transcript

HALF HUNDRED-WEIGHT OF GOLD. VICTORIA COLONIST OFFICE. MONDAY MORNING, 3 O’CLOCK. Yesterday the astounding intelligence spread like wildfire through the town, that some parties had brought in a HALF-HUNDRED of GOLD! We made enquiries, and are enabled to state that it is a fact. The parties are at Mr Donnelley’s, Joiner’s Arms, opposite to our office. We have not seen the glittering mass, as it is sealed up, but Mr Donnelly [sic] informed us that the reports as to the quantity of gold are quite correct. It varies in size from duck-shot to a hen’s egg! No admixture of quartz. It was collected in two days and a half, by Cavangh’s party of seven men, and the cradle was not required to separate it from the soil. We hear that if not purchased by Dalgety, Gore and Co., it will be deposited in one of the Banks. —————————— POSTSCRIPT. We stop the press to announce that a still larger quantity of gold has been discovered by another party of fourteen—about a HUNDREDWEIGHT. The police are escorting at least £17,000 worth into Geelong. Argus, 30 September 1851