The Complete Golfer, Harry Vardon [red novels .txt] 📗

Good golf in the United States—My tour through the country—Mr. Travis's victory in our Amateur Championship—Not a surprise—The man who played the best golf—British amateurs must wake up—Other good Americans will come—Our casual methods of learning golf—The American system—My matches in the States—A good average—Driving well—Some substantial victories—Some difficult matches—Course records—Enthusiasm of the American crowds—The golf fever—The king of baseball takes to golf—The American Open Championship—A hard fight with J.H. Taylor—A welcome win—Curious experiences in Florida—Greens without grass—The plague of locusts—Some injury to my game—"Mr. Jones"—Fooling the caddies—Camping out on the links—Golf reporting in America—Ingenious and good—Mistakes made by non-golfing writers—Lipping the hole for a hundred dollars.

Ihave a higher opinion of both the present and the future of golf in America than that which seems to be entertained by a large number of eminent players in this country. I think that American golf is very good at the present time—much better than it is given credit for being—and I am convinced that it will be still better in the future. I made a long golfing tour through the United States in 1900, when Englishmen for the most part regarded the game in that country with as much seriousness as they would have bestowed upon golf in Timbuctoo if they had heard that it was being played there. At that time it seemed to be taking a firm grip of our cousins, and I saw enough to convince me that America was coming on quickly, and that before long the old country would have reason to fear her. Everything that has happened since then has strengthened my belief, and the eyes of the British were at last fairly opened when the Championship was played for at Sandwich in June of last year, when, to the chagrin of our own leading amateurs, an American, in the person of Mr. Walter J. Travis, became the victor, and took back with him across the Atlantic the Amateur Championship Cup. So far from surprising me, that event was exactly what I expected. When I was in America I played against Mr. Travis once or twice, and though he was then in the improving stage and evidently not at the top of his career, I felt that he was a man who might very likely do great things in the future. Afterwards I followed his play with some curiosity and interest. I saw that in course of time he beat many good men whose form I understood precisely. I knew that he was one of the steadiest golfers I had ever seen—a man of fine judgment and marvellous exactness, who always played with his head, and was constantly giving the closest possible study to the game. I felt that when he came to play for our Championship he would make a very bold bid for it. When I heard that he was going to Sandwich last year, I made him my "tip" for premier honours, and before the first round was played I said to many friends, "Mark my words; if Travis gets anything like a fairly easy draw to start with he will go right through." And so he did. I saw him play on this memorable occasion, which will never be forgotten as long as any of the events of golfing history are remembered, and, in opposition to the opinions of other British critics expressed in many columns of print during the weeks following, it was and is my absolute conviction that his was the best golf played in that tournament, and that he thoroughly deserved to win. He played with his head the whole way through, and his golf was really excellent. It was only natural that our people should be very downhearted when they saw what had happened, for it seemed nothing else than a great disaster. I do not think that in the long run it will prove to have been so, for the inevitable effect of it was to wake up our British golf, which stood sadly in need of arousing. I think that amateur golf in this country has been steadily depreciating for some time, and at the present moment I think that the standard of merit of our best players is lower than in the days when Mr. Harold Hilton, Mr. John Ball, jun., and the late Mr. Freddy Tait were at their best. And despite the American shock, I cannot profess that the outlook at the present moment is particularly encouraging. There are other good golfers in the States besides Mr. Travis, and, frankly, I think that unless we wake up in this country the Cup will go there again. For the moment our numerical strength in the Championship tournament is in our favour. When there are only half a dozen Americans entered out of a total number of over a hundred, the odds are evidently against them, but an "American invasion" is threatened, and then we shall see what we shall see.

The chief reason why it is difficult to feel optimistic about the prospects of amateur golf in this country is because the rising generation, upon whom we must depend for our future champions, do not take sufficient pains to make themselves masters of the game. They are too haphazard in learning it. The beginners on our side are too apt to say to themselves, "I will go and teach myself to hit a ball first, and then I will take a lesson," which is, of course, entirely wrong. Then one of their friends tells them to do a certain stroke in one way, and another tells them the opposite, and thus at the end of six months they have got into such a thoroughly bad style that it is the most difficult task in the world for a professional to set them right. Those who have the future of British golf at heart cannot afford to disregard or wink at these vagaries on the part of beginners, on whom we depend to constitute the national system in coming years. Now the national system of America is altogether different. They are not haphazard there. They seem to take a deeper interest in the game and its science, and they never think of trying to learn it by the chance methods which are so much in favour with us. They