The Best Compliment To A Child Or

To Get An Elementary Grasp Of The Game Of Golf, A Human Must Learn, By Endless Practice, A Continuous And Subtle Series Of Highly Unnatural Movements, Involving About Sixty-four Muscles, That Result In A Seemingly Natural Swing, Taking Two Seconds To Begin And End.

There Is Even - As With No Other Game - A Fascinating Detective Literature, A Wry Commentary On The Human Comedy, Implicit In The Book Of Rules.

So The British, Of All Ages, Still Walk The Course. On Trips To Florida Or The American Desert, They Still Marvel, Or Shudder, At The Fleets Of Electric Carts Going Off In The Morning Like The First Assault Wave At The Battle Of El Alamein. It Is Unlikely, For Some Time, That A Briton Will Come Across In His Native Land Such A Scorecard As Henry Longhurst Rescued From A California Club And Cherished Till The Day He Died. The Last On Its List Of Local Rules Printed The Firm Warning "a Player On Foot Has No Standing On The Course."

When That Happens [the Demise Of Golf], Old Men Will Furtively Beckon To Their Sons And, Like Fugitives From The Guillotine Recalling The Elegant Orgies At The Court Of Louis Xv, Will Recite The Glories Of Portmarnock And Merion, Of The Road Hole At St. Andrews, The Sixth At Seminole, The Eighteenth At Pebble Beach. They Will Take Out This Volume From Its Secret Hiding Place And They Will Say: "there Is No Question, Son, That These Were Unholy Places In An Evil Age. Unfortunately, I Had A Whale Of A Time."

Americans Are Less Mystical About What Produced Their Inland Or Meadow Courses; They Are The Product Of The Bulldozerm Rotary Ploughs, Mowers, Sprinkler Systems And Alarmingly Generous Wads Of Folding Money.