Now let us look at these bye-laws and see how careful we must be when we go to the great city of golf, and for what we may be fined a pound or lodged in a Fifeshire gaol for a full fortnight, during which our game might go to rack and ruin.
In the first place it is set down that "no person shall play cricket, football, or any game other than golf upon the golf courses." Surely nobody who ever went to St. Andrews would wish to play any other game, but here we have it plainly set forth that the golf of St. Andrews will bear no rivals, and it must be remembered that the great putting green, on which the fifth and thirteenth holes are made, is big enough for several cricket pitches, and also that the large flat space along which a fairway for the first and eighteenth is situated might be made into various football grounds. But what sacrilege! It is well that men may be sent to prison if they ever committed it. Then you may be punished by law if you do not begin your match at the first teeing ground, but no doubt some thousands of people in their time have risked chastisement for this offence. "No player shall, in teeing his ball, raise the turf of the teeing ground." There is sand there for him who wants it, and he must not make his tee in the prehistoric way. After this there are some points of etiquette which are made matters of law. Elsewhere, if we disregard the etiquette of the game as set forth at the end of the rules, we are merely told about it by other people and regarded as very badly-mannered golfers, but at St. Andrews the sovereign or fourteen days needs to be considered. Thus "no player shall play from the tee until the party in front have played their second strokes and are out of range, nor play to the putting green till the party in front have holed out and moved away." And again, "players looking for a lost ball must allow any other match coming up to pass them," and "every caddie, and every player unaccompanied by a caddie, shall replace any turf that may be accidentally removed by the player's club, and shall press it firmly with the foot." Then we may be fined or sent to prison if, when practising, we drive a ball off a putting green, that is, within twenty yards of a hole, and the eighth clause is that which is known to all men—"To prevent destruction of the turf of the golf courses, play or practice with iron clubs alone is prohibited." Also, "no practice is allowed over the first and eighteenth holes of the Old Course, nor shall any practice be allowed over any part of the golf courses so as to obstruct or delay players."
Upon all this, it is enacted that when playing with three or more balls we must allow those who are only playing two, as in an ordinary single match, to pass us on being requested to do so, that we must let a match through if we do not play the whole round but cut in somewhere, that we must not pierce the ground with any golf club support nor with the flags from the holes, nor must we drive towards any person without calling out "Fore!" and waiting until he gets out of range. No man when at St. Andrews is allowed "to play the short game at the regular golf holes, except when engaged in a regular game of golf," and, as said, "no practising is allowed on the eighteenth putting green." There are five other bye-laws, mostly long, but the only other one which is specially interesting is that which is designed to preserve the integrity of the Swilcan Burn, which has played its part so thoroughly and drastically at times of great competitions. No other golf stream is protected by an Act of Parliament in the way that this one is, and its high dignity is unimpeachable. We are warned, under the usual penalty of a fine or imprisonment, that "no one shall wade in the Swilcan Burn, so far as it flows through the Old Course, nor shall any one, except players or caddies in search of their ball, do anything to cause its waters to become discoloured or muddy." There are surely times when we feel that we could not do anything to make the Swilcan Burn appear uglier than it does at those times.
Why a distinction should be made between the "bye-laws" and the "general regulations," four in number, is not quite clear, but it would appear that the penalties of fine and imprisonment may be inflicted if the latter are disobeyed as well as the former. If that is so, we begin to wonder when we see the warning that "no one shall use profane language upon the links to the annoyance of the lieges." Let us then hope, for the sake of the law and our respect for it, that the lieges are not habitually in the neighbourhood of the putting green when putts are being missed that should not be. But it is good to see that there is a kind of general warning that "no one shall annoy or interfere with any one exercising a legitimate use of the links," which means, of course, playing golf. We golfers, according to these bye-laws and the Act of Parliament which supports them, may be sent to prison for doing so many things that it is excellent to know the common people may be cast there also if they meddle with us when we play the game in our own good way, and manage by thought and attention to avoid infringement of the many cautions which the fathers of St. Andrews have prescribed for our welfare and that of their dear old course. The Sheriff of Fife has set it down that he "allows and confirms" these bye-laws, the Secretary of Scotland has officially approved of them, and the staff employed by the Green Committee are authorised to see that they are obeyed, especially those about replacing turf, playing with irons only, and practising at the first and eighteenth holes. Contemplating these enactments, we conclude that St. Andrews is the best and proper place for the upbringing of the golfer's son.
CHAPTER III
THE TRAGEDIES OF THE SHORT PUTT, AND A CONTRAST BETWEEN CHILDREN AND CHAMPIONS, WITH THE VARIED COUNSEL OF THE WISEST MEN.
The case of an earth so well explored by golfing travellers having been considered as the third of the wonders of the sphere, and the peculiarity of St. Andrews as the fourth, there is a clear suggestion as to which is the next or fifth wonder of the series. Inevitably one recalls the tearful situation of the mighty hunter in a story which is passed in company as fact. He declared he had encountered all the manifold perils of the jungle, had tracked the huge elephant to its retreat, and had stood eye to eye with the man-eating tiger. It is believed that he had done all these things. Then he added, "And never once have I trembled until I came to a short putt." For me one of the most remarkable things I have seen in golf was at an Open Championship meeting at St. Andrews when, watching and musing by the side of the eighteenth green, I saw four of the greatest players of this or any other time come up to it in the competition one by one and have putts of less than eighteen inches at that hole. Three of the four missed! In the old days, at all events, when the greens were not quite as they are now, but became very glassy and slippery with much wind and constant play upon them, I believe there were more short putts missed on the old course at St. Andrews than on any other two courses in the world, and the task of holing the little stupids on that home green was a most tormenting ordeal.
So, with the broken-hearted explorer, and the tragedy of St. Andrews, there is pointed to us for the next wonder of the game the missing of the short putt. And I do believe, and so must others, that the missing of such a short putt as it seems humanly impossible for any man, having the control of his limbs and being compos mentis, to miss is one of the most remarkable features of any game, and one that would be completely and absolutely inexplicable did it not in itself offer a most splendid illustration of the full effect of strain of mind on physical action, of the pressure of great responsibility on an over-anxious man. It embraces nearly the whole psychology of golf. The short putt largely explains the game, and it is testimony to the soundness of this view, and the rightful selection of this as a permanent wonder, that the general public would never believe the truth as we know it, that it is possible for the greatest players with what is to them, for the time being, almost as much as their lives depending on it, to miss putts so little that no walking baby properly fed would miss. The general public, with its vast stores of common sense, would not believe the fact; it would ridicule it and treat the whole suggestion with contempt, and it might in a sense be right; but then the general public has not been fighting its way round a golf course against another and very truculent general public, driving, playing seconds and thirds, getting bunkered and recovering, and encountering all manner of difficulties and dangers, and then had its fate for the day depending on a short putt at the eighteenth green! By psychology of the game, as just mentioned, we mean, of course, the way in which the mind and the emotions act and react upon the physical system and its capacity, how doubts and fears are engendered, and things from not seeming what they are become really different, so far as the attitude of the player to them is concerned. Thus, as has been well said, a putt of ten inches on the first green is, as one might feel, a putt of thirty inches—though still in fact of the same length—when that green is not the first but the thirty-seventh, and that on which a long-drawn-out match is being finished.