Page:Travel letters from New Zealand, Australia and Africa (1913).djvu/275

 At home, I have noticed the quiet amusement with which a German-American regards a raw Dutchman who has just landed. I think the Americans we meet here regard us in the same way. They are polite, and glad to see us, but they are undoubtedly amused at our appearance, our ways and our talk A peculiarity of Johannesburg is that coal mines are operated within sight of the gold mines; and in no other gold camp is fuel so convenient.

—The first Americans we met in Johannesburg are interested in banking, life insurance and real estate, and occupy a fine building of their own on a down-town corner. One of them is T. W. Schlessinger, formerly of New York. Eight years ago he was a life insurance solicitor. Today he is the controlling power in five different important companies, and we hear it said that within two or three years he may be the leading man of Johannesburg. I. F. Atterbury, manager of the African Realty Trust, is not only an American, but he comes from St. Joseph, Missouri, which we can see from Potato Hill Farm. And what still further endeared him to us is the fact that his wife also comes from St. Joseph. Nineteen years ago Mr. Atterbury was a real-estate agent in St. Joseph, and, as the town was dull at that time, he was greatly interested in the prosperity reports that came in every little while from Johannesburg, South Africa. After his arrival here, he made money, but lost it during the business panic following the Boer