Briefwisseling oor Kaapse sake 1778-1792

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XXXIX. H. Cloete

Memorial of the necessary costs of Constantia

1.	For the purchase of the farm Constantia ...
2.	Erection of new buildings and further improvements ...
3.	Purchase of slaves, including
	For me: A cook and his assistant
	For the slaves: a cook and his assistant
	2 house slaves
	4 house slave girls
	Coachman, stableboy, groom.
		Although I keep only a few cattle for two or three months in the year for their manure, I nevertheless need a cattle herd.
		A shepherd for the small number of slaughter sheep for household use. There are only 30 to 40 sheep of which only half are eaten - owing to the poor pasturage half are so lean as to be uneatable
		2 gardeners and three part-time garden slaves who in addition must work at scalding the vats and rendering them vinous, and in the wine-cellars.
		30 working slaves
		A total of 50 whom I reckon on average to have cost about 1 000 gl. each according to deed of sale.
4.	Furniture, pots and pans, etc. ...
5.	Fustage and other cellar requisites, including copper kettles for the scalding of vats.
6.	9 carriages and 3 riding-horses. N.B. 15 horses in use.
7.	Necessary good waggons and other vehicles. All the above, as a whole, in my view cannot be reckoned at less than 20 000 gl. but I have reasons for making it 18 000 gl. viz. 2 000 less. The interest on 18 000 gl. at 6 per cent p.a. comes to 1 080 gl.
8.	For the upkeep of 50 slaves (male and female) for food, clothing and surgeon's fees at 100 gl. p.a. ...		5 000 gl.
	NB. The 4 house girls have several children who have to be maintained.
9.	100 loads of manure p.a. I have it brought from Muizenberg. The Company pays Rds. 8 per load to G. Munnik for the transport of bricks and I reckon the cost at Rds. 5 per load, viz. 900 gl. less ...		1 500 gl.
10.	300 muids barley for fodder for horses, pigs and poultry, and for travellers. I could safely reckon 400 muids which at the low price of 12 schell. per muid would come to 1 800 gl. However, for my own

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	reasons I shall reckon only on 300 muids at Rd. 1 per muid (900 gl. less) ...	900 gl.
11.	25 loads of chaff for which I would willingly pay Rds. 18 per load, so that the 25 loads would come to 1 350 gl. I shall reckon it as 25 loads at Rds. 12 (450 gl. less) ...	900 gl.
12.	Household expenses are excluded save for the annual douceur paid to my son Hendrik for his assistance on the Constantia farm ...	2 000 gl.
13.	Wages for the knegts who must keep the wild buck out of the vineyards at night and also act as night-watchmen for the farm ...	216 gl.
14.	What ought I to reckon annually for the maintenance of my son Hendrik and his wife and 4 children, and the knegt night-watchman for food, drink, tea, coffee, sugar, etc. and also for what is consumed by travellers? Nothing included for this also.
15.	Smith's and waggon-makers' annual charges for repairs to waggons etc. On average ...	400 gl.
16.	Every year 3 leaguers of genuine Constantia wine of which one must be used for strengthening ‘dop’ and two for making the Company's casks vinous, reckoned at the price of ordinary wine of superior quality (‘maagwijn’) or Rds. 15 per half aum (excluding fustage) ...	1 080 gl.
17.	Annual expenses therefore run to ...	22 796 gl.
18.	According to my books, from my occupation of Constantia to 31 Dec. 1787, my sales to the Company and privately average yearly:
	32¼ leaguers of wine for the Company for which it pays
	16⅛ leaguers red wine at Rds. 100 per leaguer ...	4 837 gl.	8 st.
	16⅛ leaguers white wine at Rds. 50 per leaguer ...	2 418 gl.	12 st.
		_____
		7 256 gl.	4 st.
		_____
	32¼ leaguers amount to 258 half-aums. Thus, an average for red and white, is Rds. 9:3- per half-aum.
	With the additional payment by the Company, according to the request of 31 August 1787 I obtained Rds. 11:6:3 for a half-aum of Constantia wine. Thus the 32¼ leaguers reckoned at this price bring in 9 142 gl. 14 st.
	NB. There must be deducted 3 schell. for the ordinance and ½% for the cashier. Thus instead of gaining I incur a loss of 13 653 gl. 2 st.
	Suppose the ship or ships in which the wines are laden are lost. Naturally I am deprived of the additional payment and enjoy only Rds. 9:3 per half-aum or Rds. 2:3:3 less. On the whole 32¼ leaguers this is 1 886 gl. 10 st. less and the loss, instead of 13 653 gl. 2 st. rises to 15 539 gl. 12 st.

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NB. I have occupied Constantia since 15 December, 1778, and since that time have lost altogether 25 slaves (men, women and children) there and elsewhere.

Among them were 6 slaves I would not have parted with for 8 000 gl.

1.	I ask how should these 25 dead slaves be reckoned;
2.	How must the risk and the depreciation through age in respect of the 50 still living slaves be reckoned;
3.	I ask also in what manner the depreciation and annual repairs to my 8 000 gl. worth of fustage and cellar equipment shall be made good; also the risk of fire. I can supply ample testimony that my warehouse in Constantia during one day in 1784 caught fire at least ten times, while in 1772 my Nooitgedagt dwelling was so suddenly consumed by fire during the night that when I had saved my family but virtually none of the furniture and silver, I had to stand patiently in the farmyard, without breeches, and watch the complete destruction of my dwelling and all it contained, and furthermore a building 80 feet long filled with various goods; and my winestore of 160 feet long filled with costly fustage and equipment (of which I was able to save only 6 or 7 vats). Hardly a plate was left to eat from or glass to drink from. On top of all that, a few months later, I had the further misfortune to lose many good slaves and slave-girls from bilious fevers.
4.	How does one reckon the perishing of horses, cattle and sheep which have to be replaced by purchase every year?
5.	and the annual purchases of spades, picks, axes and bill-hooks, saws, pruning knives, grape baskets, sulphur and sulphur cloths, corn and chaff sacks.

PS In 1771 I was so set back by the above-mentioned serious fire and death of many good slaves that I was forced to sell the ‘opstals’ (farmsteads) of 4 Company's farms which I held in ‘leening’ (the so-called loan-farms) on and over the Oliphants River. The money thus raised and the slaves working on these four farms were employed in overcoming my misfortunes on Nooitgedagt.

Cape of Good Hope. Mid-December, 1788. H. Cloete.