Horace on the Links. By C. J. B. and P.
S. W. (Swan Sonnen- schein and Co. 2s. 6d.)—Messrs. "C. J. B." and "P. S. W." para- phrase eighteen odes of Horace into golfing language, and add notes collected from the writings of Mr. Horace Hutchinson, to whom the volume is dedicated. (Is there a hidden joke in giving the dates of Horace the Elder, as we may call him, as "B.C. 30 to A.D. 13"? They should be 65-8 B.C.) The accommodations of Horace are often good. Here is one of the first and last stanzas of " Te marls et terse " :— "Professor, who cant weigh the sea and land, And analyse to atoms every grain,
How strange it is a little common sand Should hold you captive by this Northern main I What is the use of seeking fourth dimensions, And scouring mentally the ethereal sphere, When you can't carry out your plain intentions, But, much against your will, lie bunkered here ?
But, friend, permit me to suggest that, if
You chance to take a little vagrant sand And tee me up, I may escape this cliff— A rub upon the green ; you understand?— No doubt you'll be in here yourself, some day,
So be not proud ; for you I'll do the same. Don't hang about the place, but walk away As soon as you have played that little game."
Then there are some miscellanea, styled "divots," which are scarcely so good. Mr. Hutchinson supplies a preface, in which he hazards the opinion that Horace (of Rome) would not have been a good, or even a keen, golfer. Why does he not quote the locus classicus, "lusum it Maecenas, dormitum ego"?
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