The Soul of Golf

by P. A. Vaile

There are no particular laws with regard to the curves of a base-ball. The same laws regulate the curves in the air of every ball from a ping-pong ball to a cricket ball, and Professor Thomson, in saying that "for the side-way curves the spin must be about a vertical axis," is absolutely wrong. Every lawn-tennis player who knows anything whatever about the American service, will know that Professor Thomson is utterly wrong in this respect, for the whole essence of the swerve and break of the American service, which has a large amount of side-swerve, is that the axis of rotation shall be approximately at an angle of fifty degrees, and any expert base-ball pitcher will know quite well that he can get his side-curve much better if he will, instead of keeping his axis of rotation perfectly vertical, tilt it a little so that it will have the assistance of gravitation at the end of its flight instead of fighting gravitation, as it must do if he trusts entirely to horizontal spin about a vertical axis for his swerve.

Professor Thomson says:

If the ball were spinning about an axis along the line of flight, the axis of spin would pass through the nose of the ball, and the spin would not affect the motion of the nose; the ball, following its nose, would thus move on without deviation.

The spin which Professor Thomson is describing here is that which a rifle bullet has during its flight, for it is obvious that the rifle bullet is spinning "about an axis along the line of flight," and that the axis of spin does pass through the nose of the bullet, but we know quite well that in the flight of a rifle bullet there is a very considerable amount of what is called drift. It is, of course, an impossibility to impart to a golf ball during the drive any such spin as that of the rifle bullet, although in cut mashie strokes, and in cutting round a stymie, we do produce a spin which is, in effect, the same spin, but this is the question which Professor Thomson should set himself to answer. He states distinctly that a ball with this spin would not swerve. If this is so, can Professor Thomson explain to us why the rifle bullet drifts? As a matter of fact, a ball with this spin would swerve, but not to anything like the same extent as would a ball with one of the well-recognised spins which are used for the purpose of obtaining swerve.

PLATE XI.

JAMES BRAID
Finish of drive, showing clearly how Braid's weight goes on to the left leg.

Professor Thomson proceeded to prove by the most elaborate experiments the truth of those matters stated by Newton centuries ago, but it will not be necessary for me to follow him in these, because these principles have been recognised for ages past.

It is curious to note that in the reference to Newton, who was aware of this principle of swerve so long ago, we are shown that Newton himself did not quite grasp the method of production of the stroke, although he analysed the result in a perfectly sound manner. Writing to Oldenburg in 1671 about the Dispersion of Light, he said in the course of his letter: "I remembered that I had often seen a tennis ball struck with an oblique racket describe such a curved line." The effect of striking a tennis ball with an oblique racket is, generally speaking, to push it away to one side. The curve, to be of a sufficiently pronounced nature to be visible, must be produced by the passage of the racket across the intended line of flight of the ball.

This matter of the different pressure on one side of the ball from that on the other is very simple when one thoroughly grasps it. Professor Thomson gives in his paper an illustration which may perhaps make the matter clearer to some people than the explanation which is generally given. He says: