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Letter ReferenceOlive Schreiner BC16/Box1/Fold5/1898/36
ArchiveUniversity of Cape Town, Manuscripts & Archives, Cape Town
Epistolary TypeLetter
Letter Date22 October 1898
Address FromJohannesburg, Transvaal
Address ToGirls Collegiate School, Port Elizabeth, Eastern Cape
Who ToBetty Molteno and Alice Greene
Other VersionsRive 1987: 337
PermissionsPlease read before using or citing this transcription
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 of this letter has been derived from the postmark on an attached envelope, while the names of the addressees and the address it was sent to are on its front.
1 Address Box 2
2 Johannesburg
3
4 Dear Friends
5
6 Cron arrives tomorrow. He is going to try & enter a solicitor’s
7office, & if he is able to do so we shall remain here. We shall not
8take a house as even a small house in Johannesburg costs £12.10 a
9month ^for rent alone^. But we I’ve taken a room in a boarding house
10on the top of the hill, where the air is so good. I am strong
11physically & can lie down more at night. I seem less able to read or
12work even than when I was in Port Elizabeth but it may be only because
13I’m better that one realized ones weakness more. Do dear heart, Cron
14& I will have plenty to live on here for ourselves. If I unreadable
15^need^ money it would only be to give it away to other people, & that
16wouldn’t be fair. I didn’t want him to go into law work: but as he
17feels he must we must just make up our minds to make the best of it.
18If ever I were dying & needed money it would all be different; but I
19shall perhaps get quite strong here. The terrible noise here the most
20distressing thing. The hundreds of f vast stamping going on all round
21the city till the earth vibrate, & they are never still day or night.
22
23 I had a line from my dear old Will this morning. He speaks very
24tenderly of Innes. He has a great affection for him. Innes has stood
25out well; & it is always harder & a braver thing to stand out against
26your own side than the enemy’s.
27
28 I enclose that horrid cutting, which please return. So far from Rhodes
29having put Will into the government, he went in against Rhodes will,
30Hofmeyr & others insisting that he should. And at the elections he was
31so particular that when Rhodes & he shared one cart, he refused to go
32unless he paid paid half.
33
34 Good bye; its such splendid news that Miss Greene is looking better.
35 Olive
36
37
38
Notation
Rive's (1987) version omits part of this letter and is also in a number of respects incorrect.