GOLF.* A NEW 'book on golf is certainly not a
thing to lay before the world without an apology, as the literature of the game has spread to a moat alarming extent of late years. But this is no reason why we should not gladly welcome a second edition of Mr. Robert Clark's excellent collection of historic and other fragments connected with golf. The first edition was a limited issue, privately printed eighteen years ago, and has been long out of print. It is probably the beat collection of the kind in existence, especially in its now revised and enlarged condition, and it is well that there should be one such book, though it is a pity there should be many more. We rather regret that a well-known golfer like Mr. Clark should not have included any of his own personal reminis- cences, especially as his lamented death since the publication of this volume has made such a record now impossible.
" Golf," begins Mr. Clark, " is a game peculiar to the Scots." We would it were. Eighteen years ago indeed this may have been the case, but to bring the book up to date, the opening sentence should clearly have been altered. It is now almost as rare to find an Englishman who is not a golfer as it was then to find one who was. The world has not been made the pleasanter thereby. For it is a well-known fact that this game imposes upon its lovers—and especially upon beginners who are still at the stage of breaking clubs—a kind of madness which obliges the victim for a season to speak golf, think golf, dream golf, import golf into every public or private occupation, and, as it were, exude golf from every pore. As long as this frenzy was only exhibited in the special sanctuaries devoted to the worship of the goddess of club and ball, or at private meetings of a few devotees, it might be suffered ; but a far more dreadful state of things followed on that dread day when Mr. Balfour came into office, and the world arose as one man and began to play golf. It is a singular thing, by the way, that there has never, so far as we know, been a public mania for cutting down trees ; yet no followers could be more devoted than those of Mr. Gladstone. But this is a digression. At the height of the new movement, when golf was dinned into every ear, not only in its native fastnesses, but in the high places of the synagogues and on the housetops, even the hardiest veteran golfers began to stir uneasily in their chairs and wish they had been brought up to play cricket in their youth ; while the small portion of the public _that remained sane, blasphemed loudly, and said things of golf which could not have been applied with any decency to trapball. The evil effects of the flood of new golfers thus let loose upon the world were soon visible, and are still to be seen. They suffered themselves from their frenzy, for many who, had their energies not been misdirected, might have been creditable statesmen,, poets, or philosophers, can now never be anything but indifferent golfers,—an abomination to themselves and to those who play behind them. But the result to golf was worse. The new golfer—we say "new" golfer out of polite- ness; in Scotland they say "English" golfer, which is clearly unjust to the countrymen of Mr. Ball and Mr. Hilton—could never, it was found, get out of their heads the idea that the
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Golfs a Royal and Ancient Game. Edited by Robert Clark. London : Macmillan and Co. solo object of golf was to get round the links in the smallest possible number of strokes. This is, of course, true to a certain extent ; but it is the ruin of match-play, which is far and away the finest form of golf, with the keen tussle for every separate hole and the display of the strategy of the game, now cautious, now daring,—here a prudent safety shot to run no risk of losing the advantage in hand, there a bold " carry " over a dangerous obstacle to make up lost ground. Careless of these niceties, the counter of his strokes slogs away at his ball straight ahead, as likely as not out of his turn, and regards his adversary merely as a casual acquaint- ance whom he is likely to meet on the putting-green. This system also, of course, entirely destroys the sociability of the game, for golf, in spite of what one often hears, is an eminently sociable game ; it is true that the person who speaks while another is in the act of playing, is worthy of a painful and lingering death, but between the strokes, especially in a foursome, there are ample intervals for conversation,—about the game, of course ; and even in a single game, the adver- sary's play is as interesting as one's own.
Two more evils may be laid to the charge of the now golfer. A natural consequence of the counting of strokes—porte jusqu'an fanalisme—is the multiplication of competitions to an endless extent; but this has been somewhat neutralised of late by playing for many of them in the form of tournaments, —that is, a series of matches, The other consequence, which, though more serious, is actually commended by Mr. Clark and other writers on golf, is the establishment of an infinite number of small courses in unsuitable places. This is lauded as a sign of the spread of the game in what were formerly the parts of the heathen, and it is always right to rejoice in the " spread " of anything, from Christian knowledge to phonetic spelling; but as a point of fact, it is an actual injury to the game. The New Golfer—there is a certain majesty about this locution, as who should say the New Reformation or the New Journalism—being eager to play, and unaware that a special soil is necessary for golf, makes what he calls a course out of the first three or four fields he comes across, with a wandering cow, or it may be his neighbour's bow-window, for the principal hazard. It is use- less to argue with him that no amount of ploughing through heavy, sticky clay will ever teach him to play on the firm, springy sea-sand of which real links are made. He only smiles with a superior air, and charges you to bring your clubs when you come to see him, and try his course ; thus is a new terror added to the invitations of one's friends. Verily, Mr. Balfour has much to answer for.
The most interesting part of Mr. Clark's collection to the outsider is the historical section, to which various additions have now been made, and which contains many interesting points which we have not found in other similar works. The game, he tells us, "may literally be said to be in Scotland a game of immemorial antiquity." He would be a bold man who would deny this. No doubt, St. Rule was in the habit of varying his homilies to the Pictish chieftains with an occa- sional round of golf, and it is a favourite theory of the present writer that on such occasions the Apostle of Fife would send down to the nearest monastery for a couple of Culdees to carry the clubs ; hence obviously the origin of the word " caddie." This suggestion has been received in the first philological circles with the utmost con- tumely. The Devil is also mentioned in legend as a golfer, which is not wonderful as he is naturally sup- posed to be skilled in all human knowledge, though he did fail to learn the Basque language. In an amusing brochure by an ardent golfer, published some twenty years ago at the metropolis of the game, there was an interesting account of the great match between the Devil and Cardinal Beaton for the latter's soul,—Mr. Clark has not mentioned this incident. As far as we remember, the Devil won through an extraordinary stroke played with his tail, which some persons were disposed to consider hardly fair ; there is, however, no provision in the rules of the Royal and Ancient Golf Club to prevent a golfer from playing with his tail. One would hardly have expected, however, to hear the Devil mentioned as a golfer from the pulpit, but Mr. Clark quotes from a sermon preached at Cambusnethan, in the old perse- cuting days, by Michael Bruce, an Irish minister, which can hardly bear any other interpretation. It dealt with " soul- confirmation," the which if a man have, "he puts the Devil to the loss of two : he losseth his pains and his profit The soul-confirmed man leaves over the Devil at two moe." For the benefit of the unlearned, it may be explained that at golf the player farthest from the hole plays first, and goes on playing till he has passed his antagonist. The first shot is called the " odd," the second, if he is not yet up with his adversary, "two more," the third, "three more," and so on. As long as the player does not get beyond the "odd," he is more or less on a footing of equality with his opponent, but when it comes to the " two more," his affairs are in a parlous state. The idea of the Christian, in his struggles with the prince of darkness, forcing the latter always to play the "two more" is truly delightful.
Mr. Clark of course lays stress on the successive enact. ments of James IL, III., and IV., to put down such un- profitable pastimes as football and golf, which kept men from turning their thoughts to archery, as proving that golf was already dangerously popular in 1457. It is curious, however, that no such writer ever notices the equally remarkable fact that the similar edict of James I., some twenty or thirty years before, forbids only football, making no mention of golf at all. Football being always named in the Acts against golf, and always first, would seem in reality to have been the fatally enchanting game which lured men away from the butts, and after provisions had been taken to stop it, subsequent legis- lators found it expedient to include golf with it as number- ing also a formidable band of enthusiasts. We do not say this in any depreciation of the royal and ancient game, but merely to prevent injustice being done to another ancient and exhilarating pastime. Mr. Clark also informs us that Queen Mary played golf, an interesting fact, considering that the intrusion of ladies on the " big " links is considered to be a fin de siecle innovation, and is still profoundly resented by the great majority of golfers. A highly edifying anecdote is also preserved of Halbert Logan, of Restalrig, who very properly refused to leave his game to obey a summons to the Privy Council. We grieve to say that the Council immediately issued a warrant for his arrest—on a charge of high-treason- and the good man was forced to take horse and fly, without finishing his round, after all. This bright example appears to us in a more shining light, that we remember hearing a shameless miscreant avowing in a golf club that he had once broken off his game abruptly to attend an afternoon tea-party. Had such a statement been heard at St. Andrews, or Mussel- burgh, the speaker would at once have fallen a victim to the just indignation of the bystanders ; but it was only at Pan, and there were those among his hearers who actually laughed ! The book is admirably got up in every way, and the illustrations, including portraits of the great Marquis of Montrose, Duncan Forbes, of Culloden, Sir Henry Raeburn, and other famous golfers—not omitting the editor himself— are excellent.
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