Four Pounds A Month, And Food For
Self, Husband, And Children, Is No Uncommon Pay For A Good Cook;
And After All Her Cookery May Be Poor Enough.
My landlady at
Capetown gave that.
The housemaid had ONLY 1l. 5s. a month, but
told me herself she had taken 8l. in one week in 'tips'. She was
an excellent servant. Up country here the wages are less, but the
comfort greater, and the chances of 'getting on' much increased.
But I believe Algoa Bay or Grahamstown are by far the best fields
for new colonists, and (I am assured) the best climate for lung
diseases. The wealthy English merchants of Port Elizabeth (Algoa
Bay) pay best. It seems to me, as far as I can learn, that every
really WORKING man or woman can thrive here.
My German host at Houw Hoek came out twenty-three years ago, he
told me, without a 'heller', and is now the owner of cattle and
land and horses to a large amount. But then the Germans work,
while the Dutch dawdle and the English drink. 'New wine' is a
penny a glass (half a pint), enough to blow your head off, and
'Cape smoke' (brandy, like vitriol) ninepence a bottle - that is the
real calamity. If the Cape had the grape disease as badly as
Madeira, it would be the making of the colony.
I received a message from my Malay friends, Abdool Jemaalee and
Betsy, anxious to know 'if the Misses had good news of her
children, for bad news would make her sick'.
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