The playing-in to the captaincy is a great ceremony, for this captaincy of the Royal and Ancient Club is the highest honour to be achieved in the game. No man who is not of the highest character and of the greatest golfing integrity is ever chosen for this high office. To be captain of the club is quite comparable to being Lord Mayor of London. Amateur champions have been captains, but no man may be captain because he has been amateur champion. It is an understanding that the captain shall win the Silver Club, given by the club a century and a half ago, and the Gold Medal, which was presented by Queen Adelaide in 1838, when she expressed the wish that the captain would wear it on all public occasions, as he does at the club meetings; and to make sure of the coincidence of the captaincy and the winning of these trophies it is ordained by custom that the captain-elect shall have no opponents in the round that he is supposed to play; and, furthermore, to make his path to victory as smooth and easy as possible, he is merely called upon to tee up his ball on the first tee in front of the clubhouse, to drive it off, and then he is supposed to have played his round and to have gained his victory.
Thus this simple historic ceremony of teeing up and driving off for the Silver Club and the Royal Adelaide Medal is a great function. Crowds gather to witness it, and a line of men and boys is stretched out along the course from the tee, often giving to the hero of the moment an all too narrow margin for error in his stroke. It is ordained that this ceremony shall be performed at the exact stroke of ten o’clock in the morning, and when the hand of the clock on the clubhouse points to that hour a military person fires a small cannon on the foreshore and—crack!—the captain-elect drives his ball, and he thus advances to the topmost height of honour. The boys rush for the ball, which, being gained by one of them, becomes an heirloom in his family. And then the real competition begins at once, and the new captain may take part in it if he wishes. The prize now is the Gold Medal with the green riband, which was given by King William IV. in 1837. The King himself decreed that it should be challenged and played for annually, and, writing from St. James’s Palace, he expressed “his satisfaction in availing himself of this opportunity to evince his approbation of that ancient institution.” Two by two the great golfers of the time go out to play for it, and excitement is keen as the day wears on. The last couple having holed out on the eighteenth green, the cannon is fired again to indicate that for one more year the Royal Medal has been won and lost, and all is over so far as the outdoor proceedings of the meeting are concerned.
In the evening is the feast, when the new captain achieves the full measure of his dignity. Hoary traditions surround his presidency at all meetings. In days of old, in the century before last, captains were fined pints and magnums of claret for certain delinquencies. At this feast the captain and ex-captains sit at the high table, in red coats, with all the ancient insignia of the club laid out on the table before them. Silver clubs are set there, to one of which each of all the long line of captains has fastened a silver ball, with his name and the date of his captaincy engraved upon it. The winner of the King William IV. Medal is toasted, and he is called up from his place that the captain with solemn ceremony may invest him with the medal, hanging it round his neck. Then, upon occasion, new members of this ancient club have been called up before the captain, who, holding one of the silver clubs before them, calls upon them to kiss it and to swear honour and obedience to the laws and customs of the club and the game. And then great golfers of the old school may sing old ballads, and an evening of happiness goes on, and if there are no trains to be caught in the morning, matches are made to-night. This is St. Andrews.
IX
The sowing of seed upon a course may seem a dull business, and the average golfer leaves the consideration of all such matters to those whose duty it is to attend to them, and contents himself with his play on the resulting turf; but in this indifference he misses much that is interesting, and occasionally some most pleasant humours, as witness the true story of what happened on a suburban links. A very thorough club manager had bought many bags of two different kinds of seed, which were to be used by an intelligent workman for the benefit of the course, according to a scheme already devised and discussed. One kind of seed was that which would produce long, thick grass of a very coarse character, and which would grow with big and almost indestructible roots under the very worst of circumstances. It was intended that this should be sown under the many trees that abounded on the course. It was not only to be grass that would thrive under the most disadvantageous circumstances, but it was meant also to be “rough,” which might some day do something to stimulate the power of language among those golfers who just now might play from underneath the branches of those trees with their putters. The other seed was that which would make grass of the very finest texture. It needed a delicate, well-groomed soil for its sustenance, and its prime object was to produce putting greens that would give great joy to golfers on their game.
So the contents of some bags were to be scattered underneath the trees, and the contents of the others were to be spread over the putting greens, and the manager rested and refreshed himself with tea while this, as he thought, was being done, and he talked pleasantly to me of the various excellences of the course and the way in which difficulties of soil and situation had been conquered. And then there broke in upon us an emissary from the man who had been sowing the seed, who came to say, “Please, sir, there’s been a sort of accident happened, and it’s like as William has been and mistaken and gone and planted the putting green seed under them trees, and he’s planted the seed as’ll make the long grass on some of the putting greens. And we want to know, sir, what we must do!” What, indeed?
X
When October comes we bid her a very loyal and joyful welcome, for we have come to regard her as the queen of months for golf. No soul so serene as that of the golfer as he tees the ball on a bright October morning. It sometimes seems to us of the links that we are glad of every change in the seasons. When it is spring, we look forward to the coming of summer, and then we sigh for the autumn, and in turn are glad even to sink back to the adventures and trials of the heroic golf that we are called upon to play in the winter-time. And yet it is seldom through discontent that we thus anticipate the changing of the seasons, but rather that we, as golfers, do so highly appreciate the glorious variety which is afforded to us by the system of Nature. Constantly happy in our game, while we are playing it, the season is for the moment forgotten, and it is only in the intervals of holes or rounds that we are roused to the eternal transformation that is proceeding.
“With thee conversing I forget all time;
All seasons and their change, all please alike.”
But there is nothing sweeter than the bright October morning on the links. A fragrant smell of moist earth rises up, and it is as if that very scent is a rare stimulant to the golfer after the heat of summer. There is a fine spring in the turf as we tread upon it, and, quite revelling in it, we find that we must needs go tripping light-heartedly along the links until the problems of the play at a couple of holes have sobered us down. We like even to see the dewdrops lingering on until starting time, taking advantage of the laggard autumnal sun. The film of mist that is hanging a few holes out, and the suspicion of a nip in the air, are fine. And then there are the glorious tints of autumn, the yellows and the crimsons and the browns, blended as only one Artist knows how to blend them, and, amidst the happiness of it all, the pathos of the scene comes in upon us as we listen to the faint crackle of falling leaves. The heart of every golfer is touched by all these changes, for whatever may have been his previous disposition and his tastes in life, each one becomes in time something of a Nature lover, and acquires a knowledge and interest in some of the simpler features of her work. For, of all games, golf is the game which is most closely allied with simple Nature. A little ball, a stick, a small hole, and the open country at her wildest and roughest, and there you have your golf. Then what is deeper than the soul’s content of the golfer when he finishes the afternoon round just as the red sun is dipping away to other lands, and by the time he and his clubs are cleaned, the twilight is already changing into the evening gloom, and the thing that it seems best to do is that which is one of the happiest in the golfer’s day, which is to sit by a bright fire and talk with one’s enemy of the links of all the good and the bad golf that has been played since the morning. Come night, we have had our day, and this talk by the fire, while the white mists gather again upon the links outside, is yet more cheering to the heart of the golfer than all the evenings of summer.