1 Bedford
2 Aug 28th 1904
3
4 Dear Laddie
5
6 I hope this will reach you on the morning of what our children used to
7call your happy day! I hope dear Laddie above all things that this
8year means good health to you because that lies at the root of almost
9all desirable things. It was passing strange to be at old Balfour. All
10All the old people gone, all changed. The the people I saw there whom
11I ever remember having seen before, were old Boy who used to sing in
12the Chaple who is quite unchanged & sings there still, & Netje the
13little hunchback servant of the Greens & Mr Theron who married a Miss
14Green, Mary Ann.
15
16 All the James & William Greens have gone. Theron is married again to a
17Scotch woman. Our old Burnet is dead. All the oranges trees have been
18cut down & the greater part of our old gardens turned into corn lands.
19Only the four unreadable are left in that upper garden are left of the
20old trees. All the big fig trees & walnuts are gone. The nature of the
21changes added greatly to the depression of those dreadful days at
22Balfour. The Therons were however very kind to me. The George
23Green’s old George Greens descendants rule the place now. Dear old
24Het found there a little Baptists Minister whom she used to know in
25Cape Town & held many services in his chaple which is built up in the
26hill side not far from the grave yard.
27
28 We outspanned our wagon a little bit higher on the hill side. It was a
29great disappointment that I could not go to see Hertzog or Philipen or
30Seymour, but one could not leave the grave for a moment, and
31afterwards there was no time. They say Burnetts wife & children are
32living at Healdtown so the world changes.
33
34^Good bye dear Laddie ^
35 Olive
36
37