"Support for John Simon in opposing the introduction of conscription" Read the full letter
| Letter Reference | Olive Schreiner: John & Mary Brown MSC 26/2.2.15 |
| Archive | National Library of South Africa, Special Collections, Cape Town |
| Epistolary Type | Letter |
| Letter Date | Monday 1904 |
| Address From | Hanover, Northern Cape |
| Address To | |
| Who To | Mary Brown nee Solomon |
| Other Versions | |
| Permissions | Please read before using or citing this transcription |
| Legend |
The Project is grateful to the National Library of South Africa (NLSA), Cape Town, for kindly allowing us to transcribe this Olive Schreiner letter, which is part of its Special Collections. The year has been assigned to this letter based on content and previous letters mentioning John and Mary Brown's daughter Ray's possible pregnancy. Content indicates Schreiner was in Hanover when it was written. She was resident in Hanover from September 1900 to October 1907, after 1902 with visits, sometimes fairly lengthy, elsewhere.
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1
Monday
2
3 Dear Mary,
4
5 I hope you are getting good news of Rays little one. Alice did not
6mention her in her last to me so I expect all was going well. Alice
7was attending my dear friend Louie Ellis who was to be operated on for
8appendicitis the day after she wrote. I am anxious for this weeks mail
9to come.
10
11 A curious thing happened this evening. I went to call on the wife of a
12Railway Engineer here who had called on me with her mother. I found
13they were the sister & mother of a girl I last saw when I was about 16;
14 she was the origin of the girl in 'The Woman's Rose." I kept the rose
15till it was destroyed with my other things in Johannesburg! It brought
16back all the past so strangely to me. She married, went to South
17America, had 7 children, & died there from taking poison, by mistake,
18they say.
19
20 I have a sweet little Persian cat, the sweetest little cat that ever
21could be. She sleeps in the top drawer of my chest of drawers. Every
22night I open it for her, & she climbs in & curls herself up & sleeps
23here, till the early dawn when she climbs out & comes to my bed.
24
25 Good night, its very late, but and I must to bed
26
27 I hope you are feeling a little stronger. I'm so glad to hear about
28the new chair, but I wish you had a donkey to pull it
29
30 Olive
31
2
3 Dear Mary,
4
5 I hope you are getting good news of Rays little one. Alice did not
6mention her in her last to me so I expect all was going well. Alice
7was attending my dear friend Louie Ellis who was to be operated on for
8appendicitis the day after she wrote. I am anxious for this weeks mail
9to come.
10
11 A curious thing happened this evening. I went to call on the wife of a
12Railway Engineer here who had called on me with her mother. I found
13they were the sister & mother of a girl I last saw when I was about 16;
14 she was the origin of the girl in 'The Woman's Rose." I kept the rose
15till it was destroyed with my other things in Johannesburg! It brought
16back all the past so strangely to me. She married, went to South
17America, had 7 children, & died there from taking poison, by mistake,
18they say.
19
20 I have a sweet little Persian cat, the sweetest little cat that ever
21could be. She sleeps in the top drawer of my chest of drawers. Every
22night I open it for her, & she climbs in & curls herself up & sleeps
23here, till the early dawn when she climbs out & comes to my bed.
24
25 Good night, its very late, but and I must to bed
26
27 I hope you are feeling a little stronger. I'm so glad to hear about
28the new chair, but I wish you had a donkey to pull it
29
30 Olive
31
Notation
See: "The Woman?s Rose" New Review vol 4, no.25, June 1891, pp.540-3.
See: "The Woman?s Rose" New Review vol 4, no.25, June 1891, pp.540-3.