Part 25 (2/2)

In like manner the stance, or way of standing when making a stroke, must be noted carefully and copied exactly. In private practice defy the inward tempter which suggests that you can do much better in some other way. Don't, above all, allow yourself to think that you will hit the ball more surely if you stand farther behind it--not even if you have seen your brother tee a ball away to the left of his left foot and still get a long shot.

[Sidenote: ”Keep your Eye on the Ball”]

Don't think that the perpetual injunction, ”Keep your eye on the ball,”

is an irritating formula with little reason behind it. It is, as a matter of fact, a law quite as much for your teacher as for yourself.

And don't suppose that you _have_ kept your eye on the ball because you think you have. It is wonderful how easy it is to keep your eye glued--so to speak--to the ball until the very half-second when that duty is most important and then to lift the head, spoiling the shot. If you can persuade yourself to look at the ball all through the stroke, and to look at the spot where the ball was even after the ball is away, you will find that you not only hit the ball satisfactorily but that it flies straighter than you had hitherto found it willing to do. When you are getting on, and begin to have some satisfaction with yourself, then remember that this maxim still requires as close observance as ever. If you find yourself off your game--such as it is--ask yourself at once, ”Am I keeping my eye on the ball?” And don't be in a hurry to a.s.sume that you were.

Always bear in mind, too, that you want to hit the ball with a kind of combined motion, which is to include the swing of your body. You are not there to use your arms only. If you begin young, you will, I expect, find little difficulty in this. It is, to older players, quite amazing how readily a youngster will fall into a swing that is the embodiment of grace and ease.

Putting is said by some to be not an art but an inspiration. Perhaps that is why ladies take so readily to it. On the green a girl is at no disadvantage with a boy. But remember that there is no ordinary stroke over which care pays so well as the putt; and that there is no stroke in which carelessness can be followed by such humiliating disaster. Don't think it superfluous to examine the line of a putt; and don't, on any account, suppose that, because the ball is near the hole, you are bound to run it down.

Forgive me for offering a piece of advice which ought to be superfluous and is not. I have sometimes found ladies most culpably careless in the matter of divots. It is a fundamental rule that, if in playing you cut out a piece of turf, you or your caddy should replace it. Never, under any circ.u.mstances, neglect this rule or allow your caddy to neglect it.

n.o.body who consistently neglects this rule ought to be allowed on any course.

A word as to clothing. I _have_ seen ladies playing in hats that rather suggested the comparative repose of a croquet lawn on a hot summer's day. But of course you only want good sense as your guide in this matter. Ease without eccentricity should be your aim. Remember, too, that whilst men like to play golf in old clothes, and often have a kind of superst.i.tious regard for some disgracefully old and dirty jacket, a girl must not follow their example. Be sure, in any case, that your boots or shoes are strong and water-tight.

[Sidenote: Keep your Heart up!]

Finally, keep your heart up! Golf is a game of moods and vagaries. It is hard to say why one plays well one day and badly another; well, perhaps, when in bad health, and badly when as fit as possible; well, perhaps, when you have started expecting nothing, and badly when you have felt that you could hit the ball over the moon. Why one may play well for three weeks and then go to pieces; why one will go off a particular club and suddenly do wonders with a club neglected; why on certain days everything goes well--any likely putt running down, every ball kicking the right way, every weak shot near a hazard scrambling out of danger, every difficult shot coming off; and why on other days every shot that can go astray will go astray--these are mysteries which no man can fathom. But they add to the infinite variety of the game; only requiring that you should have inexhaustible patience and hope as part of your equipment. And patience is a womanly virtue.

[Sidenote: A mere oversight nearly wrecked two lives. Happily the mistake was discovered before remedy had become impossible.]

Sunny Miss Martyn

A Christmas Story

BY

SOMERVILLE GIBNEY

”Goodbye, Miss Martyn, and a merry Christmas to you!”

”Goodbye, Miss Martyn; how glad you must be to get rid of us all! But I shall remember you on Christmas Day.”

”Goodbye, dear Miss Martyn; I hope you won't feel dull. We shall all think of you and wish you were with us, I know. A very happy Christmas to you.”

”The same to you, my dears, and many of them. Goodbye, goodbye; and, mind, no nonsense at the station. I look to you, Lesbia, to keep the others in order.”

”Trust me, Miss Martyn; we'll be very careful.”

”I really think I ought to have gone with you and seen you safely off, and----”

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