1 Matjesfontein
2 Dec 27th 1906
3
4 My darling Friend
5
6 It is a most curious thing that in all the long letter I’ve just got
7from you that there has not been one word, I might almost say, that I
8did not know! The curious thing is that Betty has told me nothing that
9I’ve known it all by instinct. She’s talked of the English climate
10suffocating & oppressing her & so on, but I’ve known every thing. I
11didn’t know how exactly I was right till I got your sweet letter. I
12do understand it all so as well as know it. But I don’t think either
13you or Betty quite realize how depressing the mere English climate is
14for a born South African. I have all my dearest friends in England,
15the life there is infinitely happier for me than the life here, & yet
16I feel the climate crushing me. I stay as long as I can & then I have
17to fly off to the continent winter after winter. And oh, the joy of
18that lighter air in Switzerland & Italy & Germany! It’s strange I
19just posted a letter to you you three days ago & now I’ve got yours.
20
21 Cron came & spent nearly three days with me; now he’s gone on to
22spend days with his mother in Cape Town. He is looking very tired &
23over worked after the fearful heat at De Aar. His business is doing
24very well there; & he has a plan to start a newspaper, which I think
25will succeed well if he can get enough people to take up shares. There
26is no paper in that part of the country now. If I am returning to
27Hanover on the 10th January. I shall live there alone till perhaps
28some day Cron builds a little house at De Aar a little out of the dust
29& heat & smoke of the station.
30
31 It is England who is going to lead in the fight for freedom just now I
32think. My heart is all there with the working men & the women.
33
34 Good bye dear one Thank you so very very
35
36^much for your letter. ^
37
38 Olive
39
40
41