Olive Schreiner Letters Online

Letter Reference	Olive Schreiner BC16/Box3/Fold3/1904/20
Archive	University of Cape Town, Manuscripts & Archives, Cape Town
Epistolary Type	Letter
Letter Date	Tuesday 28 June 1904
Address From	Hanover, Northern Cape
Address To
Who To	Betty Molteno
Other Versions

The manuscript of this letter by Olive Schreiner belongs to the Archive referenced above; its ownership of the original should be acknowledged by referencing the letter as indicated: Copyright transcription: © Olive Schreiner Letters Project. This transcription can be freely used as long as copyright is acknowledged and it is referenced using the following citation: ‘Olive Schreiner to Betty Molteno, 28 June 1904, UCT Manuscripts & Archives, Olive Schreiner Letters Project transcription’. Please also supply letter line numbers for specific quotations.

Legend
The Project is grateful to Manuscripts and Archives, University of Cape Town, for kindly allowing us to transcribe this Olive Schreiner letter, which is part of its Manuscripts and Archives Collections. The date has been written on this letter in an unknown hand. The name of the addressee is indicated by salutation and content. Schreiner was resident in Hanover from September 1900 to October 1907, after 1902 with visits, sometimes fairly lengthy, elsewhere.

1:  Tuesday morning
2: 
3:  My dear Friend
4: 
5:  I have not written the last days as I have not been very fit the last
6:  week or ^ten^ days & ?asked could not write the last four or five days.
7: 
8:  Thank you so much for your letters. I am so anxious to know how you
9:  like Matjesfontein but as you may have changed your minds about going
10:  there I address this still to Kenilworth
11: 
12:  At the end of July I could let you know the exact date soon, I have to
13:  go to Kat River with my sister Mrs Lewis to get my fathers remains.
14:  Now, a plan has struck me. It is always warm & dry & delightful in Kat
15:  River in the winter. Miss Greene knows the lovely Kat Berg Station:
16:  there in an hotel there very nice place. Would it not be a good place
17:  for you & Miss Greene to go to while this awful cold lasts. At the end
18:  of July I would join you there. When we had got my father’s remains
19:  Mrs Stakesby Lewis will return with them to Cape Town & I & you could
20:  go down to the Kowie where Cron promises to join us. To me of course
21:  it would all be something too beautiful. What do you think of the
22:  plan? Write & let me know at once. On your way to Kat River you might
23:  stop here for a few days, at the Hotel if Mrs Van Zijl cannot take you
24:  in. Or you might return here with me when we come back. The best time
25:  of the year to go to Kat River is the winter it is warm & dry &
26:  beautifully sunny. I could show you all the places I was in as a child
27:  & it would all be lovely. Write & let me know. I am feeling pretty
28:  unfit, I can’t believe I am the same person who was so strong & well
29:  in Cape Town.
30: 
31:  I am sure Kat River would do Miss Greene good as well as you. But you
32: 
33:  ^must stay up at the sanatorium at the Kat Berg Station: write to that
34:  address if you want them to take you in. I hoped against hope it was a
35:  passing thing but it must be the height & the cold making me so ill
36:  here. My dear Boy is well. So sweet & contented with the very poor
37:  dinners I have turned out lately. It struck me suddenly this afternoon
38:  that perhaps Kat River would just suit you. ^
39: 
40:  Olive
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42: 
43: