GOLF DE PARIS, AND SOME REMARKABLE EVENTS AT VERSAILLES AND CHANTILLY,
WITH NEW THEORIES BY HIGH AUTHORITIES.
In front of the red brick club-house of the Royal Liverpool Golf Club at
Hoylake, a citadel which by its tower and clock commemorates the great
achievements of Hoylake's famous son, John Ball, there was assembled
late in the afternoon of Friday, the 21st of June 1907 (being the
forty-seventh year of the Open Championship), a large gathering of
golfing persons who by their speech and demeanour suggested some of the
vivid unrealities of a stage crowd near the footlights. They had a
self-conscious and somewhat artificial bearing towards each other. They
muttered and beckoned. They gave the impression of being a little uneasy
and nervous. Friends among them who essayed to conduct a conversation
found themselves at a loss for appropriate comments upon what had
happened and made remarks which had no clear or relevant meaning.
Professor Paterson, wearing the red rosette, came from the house and
stood before the little table bearing a silver cup which had been held
by the line of champions all the way from the time of Morris, the
younger, and a familiar friendly figure in chequered garments moved
about in a manner of official preparation. What had happened had indeed
been dramatic; but the drama had had the living circumstance of full
reality. We could not discuss constructions and readings, and suggest
other endings. Here was the one gross fact, that Arnaud Massy, a Basque,
the professional attached to the leading club of Paris, a strong bonily
built man with no British blood in his being, had just made himself the
possessor for the year of that historic championship cup, which hitherto
had never been taken out of the United Kingdom. This was something which
the gathering did with difficulty absorb into their golfing minds. They
were good sportsmen, and they cheered because they knew that this Massy
was a fine fellow and a good champion; but it was all a little
dream-like, and there was a spell that needed to be broken.
Massy, the victor, with a big smiling face came forward. The gold medal
was delivered to him. There was a little silence, a few muttered
incoherent words, and then this splendid Massy threw up his hands into
the air and shouted out with a full blast from his lusty lungs, "Vive
l'entente cordiale!" The tensity was broken; the people cheered easily,
naturally, and whole heartedly; they accepted Massy as the true and
proper successor to James Braid in the Open Championship, and wished him
thoroughly well--even though he were a Frenchman or a Basque. He had
done the right thing.
This foreign player (never forgetting that he was trained to the game at
Biarritz, which in golf is mostly British, though it lies under the laws
of France) was brought to England and Scotland by Sir Everard Hambro,
and was improved in golf at North Berwick with Ben Sayers assisting him.
He well deserved to win that championship, and it should not be
overlooked that, so to say, he has confirmed his victory by making a tie
for the championship again since then. He is the only man outside the
great triumvirate who has done so much as twice to reach the top of the
list in modern times. He was well on his own very good game. There was a
crispness about his play with his wooden clubs that indicated the man
who for the time being had full confidence and could hit his hardest.
And Massy's putting, especially in the case of the most difficult and
fateful of all putts, those of from five to nine feet--putts for the
missing of which there is the fullest excuse, for whose holing there is
enormous gain--had been splendid for a long time before and was most
excellent then. At those putts of the kind I remark upon I do not think
that Massy in accuracy or confidence has his equal in the world. He
strokes the ball into the hole as though it were the simplest thing to
do; easily and gracefully he putts it in. In other ways he makes a fine
figure of a golfer. Military training in France has given him a stiffer,
straighter build than most great golfers have, for this game tends a
little to a crouching gait and posture. Massy marches from the tee to
the ball that has gone before with a quick, regular step of the
right-left-right military way, and when he comes up with the ball he
does a right wheel round, presents his club, and plays his second with a
quickness and lack of hesitation in which he is second only to George
Duncan. Particularly in putting is Massy a man of inspirations and quick
impulse. And I must not now forget that there is in the world a charming
little lady who is called Mlle. Hoylake Massy, which is her proper name.
Providence is disposed often to be kind and generous to the strong and
those who have well deserved, and that week Mme. Massy gave to the man
who was even then making himself the champion a sweet little daughter.
Having won the championship, the next question was one of christenings,
and, said Massy to his wife, "Voila! Surely she shall be called our
little Hoylake!" Which she was accordingly, Mme. Massy, rejoicing in her
husband's success, like the good, happy little woman of Scotland that
she is, having cordially agreed.
And in France there were rejoicings among the golfers. My friend, M.
Pierre Deschamps, fine and keen sportsman (and the "father of golf in
France," as we call him for the grand work he has done in establishing
the game so well at La Boulie, where he is president of the Societe de
Golf de Paris, and encouraging it with all his heart and energy
elsewhere in his country), rose and made a remarkable declaration that
golf was to be the "national game of France." The national game of
France, our Scottish golf of English development, started, as some still
will have it, in Holland, played in some sort of way as _jeu de mail_
even in France, practised in Pekin, called the "national game" also, as
I have heard it, in America--now it was to be naturalised and made the
"national game of France!" Ubiquitous golf indeed! M. Deschamps, whose
words are careful if they are quick, as befits one who is in the
diplomatic service of his country, sat down and wrote an essay on golf
in general, and Massy's success in particular, and, addressing the new
champion as if he were before him, said: "Et maintenant a vous la
parole, mon cher Massy; continuez votre brillante carriere, jouissez de
votre belle gloire dont nous sommes tous fiers, comme Golfeurs et comme
Francais; a cette heure, ou tant de links s'ouvrent chez nous, pour
repondre aux besoins d'enthousiastes sportsmen, puissent d'autres
professionels de notre race suivre votre example, unique encore dans les
fastes du 'Royal and Ancient Game,' et contribuer a faire de ce sport un
jeu national dans notre beau pays de France!" That was written. In
victory you may be magnanimous, and M. Deschamps at this time would
graciously waive all questions of origins and growths; he must have felt
that then it mattered little that a kind of golf called _chole_ had been
played ages back by the people of the north, and that it was possible
the Scots had copied from them. It was enough that Arnaud Massy was "le
Champion du monde."
* * * * *
Disregarding all those doubts about the _jeu de mail_ and the game of
_chole_, and considering only the real thing as we know it, taking its
time from the stone temple by the Fifeshire sea, it was away back in
1856 that the game was first played on the soil of France, and that was
in the south by the Pyrenees at Pau. Yet at that time only the wintering
British were concerned. Forty years went on before the French themselves
made a fair beginning with the game. In 1896 the Societe de Golf de
Paris was established, and it has been a splendid success. To-day in
prestige and influence it stands for the headquarters of the game in the
country, though since it was begun there have sprung up many clubs of
great pretensions, with good courses, nice club-houses, distinguished
memberships, and unlimited francs. Yet La Boulie holds her queenship
still. Excellent golfing places have been made at Chantilly, Le Pecq,
Compiegne, Fontainebleau. Out on the north-west coast at such resorts as
Le Touquet, Dieppe, Deauville and Wimereux by Boulogne the game is
established. Long years back I played at pretty open Wimereux when there
was but a nine-holes course there, and not the excellent one of eighteen
that has now been made. Shall it not be considered as a happy token that
golf links are commonly found on old battlefields and at places where
armies have encamped? Sometimes this is just because the soldiers play
the game when they are abroad; sometimes it is because entrenchments are
bunkers all prepared; but oftenest it is just coincidence. Whatever it
be or why, it is the fact that there is golf where armies and battles
have been in Egypt, in South Africa, in the United States and Canada,
and at many places. Where there was the fury of flying shells there is
now only the peaceful hum of the rubber ball. One recalled when first at
Wimereux that here the great Napoleon had encamped with his grand army,
the same as was to cross the Channel to defiant isles and make a
conquest of them. But playing neither the first hole nor the last do we
need any reminder of what great Bonaparte wished to do, for by us there
towers aloft the monument that he had erected to that successful
invasion of Albion that never did take place. Hereabouts is indicated
the place where the master-general in full satisfaction with the
progress of things, and in remembrance of great achievements,
distributed his military favours. And here all along are deep
grass-covered trenches, and larger, rounder, shallow pits that once
might have been kitchens or stables. All these that now are bunkers and
hazards are where Napoleon camped and waited. And on a fine day our
white-cliffed Albion is in full view. Sometimes there may even be a sigh
as one reflects that the Corsican little dreamt of what should be done
with his camping land when a hundred years were gone, that those
sportsmen of Britishers would be playing their game about there, taking
their divots and holing their putts, and striving for golden tokens
given for competition by the mayor and municipality of adjacent
Boulogne! It was not for no reason that Arnaud Massy called aloud "Vive
l'entente cordiale!" In the heart of the country there have been more
golf clubs and courses formed, and they are supported now mostly by the
French. At Rouen and Rheims the game may now be enjoyed. It is
spreading. M. Deschamps may yet be soundly justified. And indeed when we
take our clubs to Paris we feel that he should, and heartily do
wandering players echo the cry of Massy, who by his victory signalised
the fact that French golf had grown from babyhood to the strength of
independence, and was now to be considered as an entity. There is a
subtle sweetness about a golfing expedition in Paris that there is about
a little holiday for the game at no other place. One is not here
suggesting that it is better for golf and other matters to go to Paris
than elsewhere, only that it is quite different, intensely enjoyable,
and easily convenient. We breakfast in comfort in London, read the
newspaper afterwards, go through the pack of clubs to see that the
roll-call is rightly answered, and with time enough for everything move
along to Victoria. Had we dawdled less we might have gone much earlier
from Charing Cross. We meet quite casually other golfers in our
compartment on the South-Eastern, and inquire with no astonishment as to
which of the Parisian courses will be scarred by their irons before
their trip is done. From Dover or Folkestone we have a quick and
comfortable crossing; we discover some people who are bound for Le
Touquet and tell us of the excellent changes there, and then on the
comfortable railway of the Nord we are swung happily into the heart of
France, and are in the capital before the sun has set on a summer's day,
and with time yet to go out to La Boulie, which is by Versailles, or
Chantilly, and stretch our English arms and legs in preparation for
matches of the morrow. We are at home as golfers without delay.
What one feels about golfing in Paris now is that while there is always
that elevation of the spirits, that sense of extra life, that little
superfineness of feeling that are induced by a sojourn in the capital by
those who feel themselves somewhat akin to her, and there is a certain
subtle difference in the golfing ways and systems, such as we not merely
find but wish for, golf at Paris and the world over is really very much
the same--the same not merely in the playing of the shots as in the
general scheme of things, the going and the coming, the _tout ensemble_.
We settle ourselves comfortably in a big hotel in the Rue de
Castiglione, and next morning we fling away the sheets before eight as
alive as any Parisian _ouvrier_. The _cafe complet_ disposed of, the
next question is that of clubs and balls. If it is a fine day and there
is time for the walking, we may stride through the corner of the gardens
of the Tuileries, across the corresponding corner of the Place de la
Concorde, over the bridge and into the station to the left by the side
of the Seine and down the steps to the platform, where there always
awaits us at the most convenient time what is in essence largely a
golfers' train. Our golfing people are in full evidence. You cannot
mistake their kind in a train of France any more than you can when they
journey from Charing Cross to Walton Heath. They pervade. So on to the
other end of the journey at Versailles, and there the carriages await
us, and the brake for those who like it, and we are bowled and rattled
along through that place which has seen much of the makings and undoings
of France, and on to La Boulie, where we hasten to the first tee,
fearful of any waiting. Or, alternatively, we take a taxi-cab that is
outside the hotel in Paris, and let loose through the Parisian streets
with it, across the Place Vendome, past the Opera, away along to the
Gare du Nord with our inimitable Parisian taxi-man hurtling round the
corners with all the fury of a charioteer in the races of ancient Rome,
making us reflect that it is well there will be a rest of an hour
before being called upon to do the first putting at Chantilly. So we
perceive that the going and the coming are very much what they might be
in England, with just that difference that gives a piquancy, while,
after a day on the course, it is found to be quite excellent to have the
gaiety of Paris at one's disposal. Those who have tried it generally
agree that golf de Paris makes the finest change of the game, the most
exhilarating that may be had by the player of the south of England, who
is not too far removed from Charing Cross or one of the ports. It may be
444 miles from our metropolis to St. Andrews, and 383 to North Berwick,
but it is only 259 to Paris, and despite the sea the journey lasts a
much shorter time than the dash to the north by the fastest trains. We
do not compare the golf of Paris with the golf of our historic and
beloved seats of the game, but the courses of France, as inland courses,
are good, and we think again of the virtues of the change complete, of
the _tout ensemble_. Good things have come out of France in the days of
long ago and in recent times; golf that is nearly of the best order
rises in it now, and when we see Mr. Edward Blackwell and some others of
the great men of the auld grey city who are most particular about all
golfing things playing themselves on the slopes of La Boulie, over the
plains of Chantilly, and through the forest of Fontainebleau, we know
that things are moving tolerably well.
* * * * *
Upon our initiation at La Boulie, our curiosity is stirred and attention
is attracted to many things. Perhaps M. Deschamps, or such a good
sportsman as the Baron de Bellet--whose son, M. Francois de Bellet, has
won the Amateur Championship of France, while Mlle. de Bellet is the
best of the lady players in the country--would conduct a guest about the
place and show him many things that would interest him, and many more
that as a golfer he would most honestly admire. La Boulie is not a great
course despite all the championships that have been played upon it, but
the Societe de Golf de Paris, which has a membership of 750 at a
subscription of about L10, is quite a great institution. Yet, let me
hasten to say that in the first remark I was judging La Boulie on the
highest inland standard, and even then the judgment must be qualified by
the statement that if not great in the best sense La Boulie is good and
is quite interesting. At one time it suffered much from the nature of
its soil and turf, but greenkeeping science, the francs of France, and
the loving and most assiduous care of M. Deschamps, have changed much if
not all of that. In the summer time it is quite one of the most
beautiful courses I can think of with its wealth of trees, in which the
nightingales sing soon after the golfers have done, and its majestic
undulations, which come so near to being mountainous that herein, with
so much climbing to be done and so many uphill and downhill shots, is
one of the greatest faults of the course. But everything is well done at
La Boulie, and human ingenuity and thoroughness are well applied. M.
Deschamps is a fine humanitarian, and exerts himself constantly for the
welfare of the caddies, who are as good for their business as any
caddies in the world. It was a happy idea on his part to have these boys
trained under a semi-military system as he has them now. They are all
housed in a building near to the first tee under the care of the club;
they have to observe regulations of duty and life which are good for
them, and they are dressed in a boy-scout khaki uniform with touches of
red to brighten it, and the principles of boy-scoutism are worked into
their young lives. This is excellent, and indeed it is the truth that
already we have a little to learn in golf from France. By the way, one
of the curious laws of the country--curious as it seems to us, though
soundly sensible--is that boys are not allowed, when under about fifteen
years of age, to carry more than a certain weight in the way of work,
and this prohibits caddies from carrying a bag of clubs of more than
fair extent. As a matter of detail you will find that the weight
quantity allowed works out to something like ten clubs of an average
mixture, but happily for some good friends of mine there is no weighing
at the first tee and no officers of the Republic there to see it done.
They threaten to arrest us at St. Andrews if we play the game with iron
clubs only, and they have the power through bye-laws ratified by
Government to do so and send us to prison. Is it possible that a
wandering player in happy France should be lodged in a modern Bastille
for that on one eager day he defied ill omen and the law by carrying
thirteen clubs in his bag, as both James Braid and Edward Ray have done
when winning championships, the weight limit being exceeded and all the
unhappiest consequences following? M. Deschamps took the initiative in
founding the Golf Union of France, which is based completely on the
American system and is likely to be a strong force in the golf of the
future.
* * * * *
To the best of my knowledge they have only one plus-handicap amateur in
France, being M. Francois de Bellet, who is rated at plus 1 at two or
three clubs, but I have examined the handicap books at different places
and find that there are a few scratch men, and that the number of
players who have single figure handicaps is quite good in proportion to
the whole, and is increasing. The fears we had that the French
temperament was not good for the game prove to be unfounded; while the
French enthusiasm is equal to anything that we know. There are cases of
golf fever in France that are every degree as bad--or as good--as those
we find here at home.
One muggy winter morning, when a friend and I teed up at the beginning
of the round at La Boulie, we could with difficulty see the flag on the
first green, short as was the hole. We surmised that we might be the
only players; but, no, many holes ahead, having started early, was a
match going on between a baron of France and one of his rivals. The
baron was taking the game with exceeding seriousness, and the
information was given to me that he played two rounds on the course
every day of his life. "Saturdays and Sundays?" I asked my caddie.
"Toujours!" was the answer. "Even if it rains?" I pursued. "Toujours!"
the boy answered with emphasis. "Or snows or is foggy?" I persisted, and
then the carrier of clubs replied a little impatiently and with
finality, "Toujours!" intending to convey that in all circumstances
whatsoever the indefatigable baron played his two rounds a day, and
independent witnesses confirmed the statement of the boy. This surely is
the French counterpart of what is considered to be the finest case of
golf enthusiasm that Britain has produced, being that of old Alexander
M'Kellar who played on Bruntsfield Links in the brave days of old and
was known for his ardour as "the Cock o' the Green." He also would play
always; when snow covered the course he begged and implored some one to
become his opponent in a match, and if nobody obliged he would go out
alone and wander the whole way round, playing his ball from flag to
flag, the greens and holes being hidden. At night he would sometimes
play at the short holes by the dim glimmer of a lamp, and golf by
moonlight was his frequent experience. Once upon a time his suffering
wife thought to shame him by taking to the links his dinner and his
nightcap; but he was too busy to attend to her. M'Kellar is long since
dead, but something of his soul survives in England--and in France. And
there are old and experienced golfers in France. There are Parisians who
are members of the Royal and Ancient Club of St. Andrews, and I have met
others who could argue most deeply with me upon the peculiarities and
merits of many British courses from Sandwich and Sunningdale to Montrose
and Cruden Bay. I took tea at Fontainebleau with M. le Comte de
Puyfontaine, who exercises a kind of governorship over the course, and
he told me that he learned his golf twenty-three years ago at a place
near Lancaster, and that since then he has played in many parts of the
United States and elsewhere.
* * * * *
I have endeavoured to make the point that the French are worthy and
thorough, that the Parisian golf and golfers must be taken seriously,
and that it is a pleasure to go among them with our clubs. Their courses
are nearly good enough for anything, and they are all different from
each other in type and characteristics. Fontainebleau is cut out of the
forest, and silver birches line the fairway, while some of the great
boulders which are peculiar to the place stand out as landmarks near the
putting greens--but not so near as to be useful to the erratic player.
Holes of all kinds are at Fontainebleau, and some of them make pretty
puzzles in the playing. The teeing ground for the third is high up on a
hill and the view is charming, but that may be of less account than the
circumstance that the carry is farther than it looks, and the hole is a
long one. The fifth is a catchy dog-leg hole, which the caddies of
Fontainebleau do not call a _jambe du chien_, as you might expect them,
but a "doc-lac." Soon the game will be Gallicised completely. The ninth,
being a drive and a peculiar pitch, is a strange hole which worries the
pair of us exceedingly. It looks one of the simplest things, but there
is an inner green and an outer one, as one might say, and the former is
on a high plateau. There is a secret about it which we did not discover
in three full days. The tenth is a fine long hole, with a guard to the
green that might have been brought up from the Inferno, and so on to the
end in great variety. I like Fontainebleau. Chantilly has less character
but more length. It is a better test of wooden club play, but not of
pretty work with the irons in approaching. Yet it is well bunkered, the
fairway is smooth and dry, as it is at Fontainebleau, all through the
winter, and the putting greens are most excellent, fast and true. If
most parts of the course are a little flat, there is a great ravine
about the middle of it which gives a touch of the romantic and helps to
the enjoyment. The turf at La Boulie does not winter so well as it does
at the other places, though the club has spent many thousands of francs
in applying real sea-sand to it for its improvement; but in the spring,
the summer, and the autumn, golf here at Versailles is a fine pleasure.
Yet some will say that, much as I tempt them, they would not after all
go to France for golf, that indeed they could never confess to others
that they had been to Fontainebleau and Versailles and Chantilly for
their game. But why may they not take their game and their historical
views and reflections on the same days, as they may do better in France
than elsewhere; though when we play at St. Andrews or at Sandwich, where
Queen Bess visited, and Westward Ho! we wonder again how strangely this
royal and ancient game does attach itself and cling to the old places of
celebrity, and especially those whose fame was made for them by kings.
It is curious. The keen golfer is a man of thought and sense. We play on
a morning at Fontainebleau, and in the afternoon we wander through the
rich galleries of the wonderful palace where many kings of France held
magnificent court, a place where the great Napoleon loved to rest a
while between campaigns. There are relics of the Emperor in many
chambers; and it was at the chief entrance here that he bade his last
good-bye to the old guard and went lonely away, an emperor no more. The
wonders and the glories of Versailles are known even to those who have
never crossed the Channel; Chantilly has had its great romances of
history also. The old castle was put up in the ninth century; here the
Condes lived in fine state, and in the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries the place was very famous. The good French have endeavoured to
make their courses suit their places. Sometimes we seem to look even on
these playgrounds for a touch of art, a little delicacy, a fineness and
a high quality, and we think in just that way of the golf de Paris when
the train of the Nord runs us homewards again.
* * * * *
The seaside golf in the northern and north-western parts of France is
coming to be an important thing in the general scheme. Personal
association and its seniority above all except Dieppe have led me
already to mention Wimereux, but the golf of Wimereux is not the queen
of the game of northern seaside France. In all honesty we must crown the
slightly younger Le Touquet, on the other side of Boulogne, with that
distinction. Here you may have one of the most charming changes of the
game, and the most wholesome, delightful rearrangement of your general
daily living system. Go to Etaples from Boulogne, then spin in the car
through that splendid forest, skimming by Paris Plage and its casinos
and evidences of lightness of life, and so through to Touquet, where
there is a course for golf that is most excellent in every respect,
lengths and character of holes, sandy nature of soil, quality of putting
greens--everything. Some of the holes are a little tricky; but the
course in general has been enormously improved in recent times, and it
well deserves the championship dignity that has now been accorded to it.
The girl caddies there are the best of their kind. I remember a little
Marie for such an intuition regarding clubs to be used as I remember no
other assistant: and after playing for a day through these avenues of
fir trees with the great banks of silver sand in the distance, shutting
off the sea, then dawdling among the coloured lights at Paris Plage
listening to the music after dinner, and in the night sleeping in an
upper room near to the links, and hearing at the last moment of
consciousness the wind music floating in from the surrounding trees, one
feels that this is almost an enchanted land, with the spirits of
happiness and pleasure controlling a joyful cosmos.
Dieppe is good, and it is quite different. Here the golf is some
seventeen years of age, the whole system of things is well matured and
settled, and the golfing season goes along with a fine swing from the
beginning to the end. It was Willie Park who first laid out this course,
but it has been much altered and lengthened since then, and now there is
a fine club-house and all that a player might wish for, and especially
one who likes to contend in competitions. There is something for such
challengers to do all the time; I know few other golfing places where
there are so many competitions in August and September, and yet they are
no nuisance to the people who say they hate such things. At Etretat the
game has been making excellent progress lately; at Deauville by
Trouville, where you bathe always except when you do not golf or sleep
or eat, it has been long established, and the course there has recently
been raised very high in quality; and at Cabourg and Havre, in the same
region, there are courses also. There are at Etretat thirteen holes, and
yet you may play a lucky round, and I am reminded that in the long ago,
when golf near the sands of Picardy was first being thought of, a wise
man of Cabourg sent for an English course architect, and, displaying to
his view one nice field, said, "Voila! Make me a hole! Two if possible!"
But they know much better now than that, and Cabourg has its full
eighteen. To golf, to lie down and sleep, to splash and tumble in the
sea, to seem to do so much and yet to do so little except make a few
drives and miss some putts--it is all a very happy holiday that you may
enjoy at these places.
* * * * *
The championships of France, which began in a small and gentle way, have
lately risen to be very important events, and they gain a most
wonderfully cosmopolitan entry. In 1913, which was the greatest year for
championships in general that the game has ever known--Taylor winning
his fifth Open at Hoylake, Mr. Hilton his fourth Amateur, Mr. Travers
his fourth American Amateur, Ouimet beating Vardon and Ray in the
American Open--the championships of France did indeed rise to the first
class, and in both events, the Amateur at La Boulie and the Open which
was held for the first time at Chantilly--and the first for it to be
taken away from the mother course at Versailles--produced some most
exciting business. I have never seen a more extraordinary final in its
way than that in the amateur event at La Boulie on this occasion, when
Mr. E. A. Lassen came to grips with Lord Charles Hope--and such grips
they were! I was led to describe it at the time as a dramatic affair of
four periods and a spasm, and that is just what it was. Lord Charles
Hope, though not physically strong, has acquired a fine game, and in the
first period of this thirty-six holes match we witnessed him playing
some quite beautiful golf and exercising the most complete
self-possession and steadiness, gradually piling up a big lead of holes
upon his more experienced opponent, who has been once Amateur Champion
of Britain and a finalist another time, and seeming to make himself a
certain winner. The duration of this period was one whole round, and at
the end of it Lord Charles had five good holes to his advantage. The
second was a period of peace, in which we watched Lord Charles keeping a
tight hold on his most valuable gains, while Mr. Lassen, if losing
nothing more, was gaining nothing when it was absolutely necessary he
should be gaining quickly if he was not to be the loser of the day. Time
was flying and holes were being done with, and fewer of them being left
for play and recovery. This period terminated at the turn in the second
round, with Lord Charles Hope still four to the good and "still
winning." The third period lasted from the tenth to the fourteenth holes
in this round, and in it the man who had seemed to be very well beaten
threw a new life into his game, tightened it up, made it exact, certain,
and aggressive, while at the same time his opponent seemed to collapse
entirely, his driving becoming soft and uncertain and his short game
nervous. The Yorkshire player won four of these five holes and at the
fourteenth he was level with his man. Never was there a more
extraordinary illustration of the truth that no match is lost until it
is won; to some extent it recalled that amazing championship at Hoylake,
when Mr. Sidney Fry so nearly gained the title after being at one time,
as it appeared, hopelessly beaten by Mr. Charles Hutchings. Now it was
surely Mr. Lassen's match; but in the crisis Lord Charles Hope came
again and fought every inch of the way home. In this period every hole
was halved to the end of the round, so that after the statutory
thirty-six had been played the state of things was as at the beginning
of the day. No business had been done, and each man might be said to
have had his tail up quite as much as the other. The spasm followed. The
thirty-seventh had to be played. Mr. Lassen teed up his ball, said to
himself that he must keep it to the left as there was the dread
out-of-bounds on the right that had been a constant trouble to him,
swung, struck, and to his dismay saw the little white ball bearing
slowly but surely to the right after all. It did not reach the trees,
but, almost as bad, it fell into the big deep bunker out that way, and
made recovery difficult. Lord Charles Hope seized his advantage. A good
ball shot straight down the middle of the fairway, and the hole and the
match were his. An extraordinary game indeed that was.
In the Open Championship at Chantilly there was an entry that was nearly
good enough for a championship on British soil. Vardon and Ray, out
across the Atlantic, were missing, but otherwise the class was as
numerous and good as need be, and there were a few of the best British
amateurs. George Duncan won, as he had won the "News of the World"
tournament the week before, and so made it clear that he had come into
his own at last. These two were his first really big victories in
classic open events, and they were brilliantly and indeed easily gained.
But it was not Duncan's victory, so well deserved as it was, that makes
this championship at Chantilly worth a place in golfing history. It was
something else that very nearly happened. Among the competitors was an
amateur in Mr. H. D. Gillies, who at different times in recent seasons
has shown an immense capacity. At St. Andrews in the Amateur
Championship only a few months before he had made a brilliant display.
Now, here, he did a thing which to the best of my belief and after a
searching of all the records had never been done before, and that was in
an open championship competition of the first order, decided by four
rounds of stroke play and with the best players of the world arrayed
against him, he as an amateur led the whole field for three consecutive
rounds. Mr. Ouimet in America did not lead for three rounds, no amateur
had led for three rounds in any open championship before, and it is not
often that any professional has done so either. Mr. Gillies has enormous
powers for concentration and effort, and, as one might say, he can
strain himself at the game until he nearly drops. In his third round he
had a wicked piece of bad luck which cost him two most valuable
shots--not the sort of bad luck that one gets through finding a
specially nasty place in a bunker, but the much worse variety which is
the result of a grave error in course construction. After one of the
finest drives one might wish to see, at a hole just after the turn he
found his ball lying on a road which had to be treated as a hazard, and
from here he was bunkered. He knew that Duncan was pressing him hard,
and that he had not a stroke to spare. Still by an enormous effort he
kept his lead, and at the end of the third round it looked as if it
would still be a lead of two strokes, when alas! on the home green he
lost a stroke in putting. Instead of having a lead of two over the
terrible George for the last round he had now a lead of only one. There
is not much difference between one and two--it may all be accounted for
by the very smallest of putts--but in a case of this kind the moral
effect is very great. You see, when you lead by two strokes you realise
that you can afford to lose one of them and still be leading, but when
you only have an advantage of one there is the cold truth that you
cannot afford to lose anything at all or the lead will go--the lead that
Mr. Gillies had held all the time. One may be sure that he felt this,
for coming off that home green some one said to him quietly, "You still
lead, Gillies," and he turned with a little melancholy and responded,
"Yes, but one stroke is not much to lead Duncan by, is it?" The effect
was visible at the first tee in the afternoon. He knew the
responsibility. He took an infinity of pains, far too much. He addressed
his ball until he was sick of looking at it any more, and then he topped
it into the bunker in front of him. Good-bye, Open Championship of
France! But there it was, a brilliant achievement for all that, and if
he had won, as once he seemed likely to do, no man could have done
justice to the golf history of that year with amateurs Ouimet and
Gillies as Open Champions.
* * * * *
Surely Mr. Gillies is one of the most interesting studies in the game at
the present time. Born in New Zealand, he became a boat-race Blue at
Cambridge, and is the only one who has won a high position in
first-class golf. Now he is a surgeon in Upper Wimpole Street, already
with a high reputation as a specialist in matters affecting throat,
ears, and other organs of the head. He is evidently a man of immense
will-power, with a most enviable capacity for concentration and for
obliterating from his mind completely what is not essential to the
business of the moment. He will work at his profession continuously for
a week or a month and only just remember golf, and then he will suddenly
appear in a great competition, perhaps a championship, and be a golfer
and nothing else whatever. That is as it should be, as it is always
supposed to be in golf, but few men can exchange themselves to this
extent. When he won the St. George's Cup at Sandwich he had not touched
a club for ages, but somebody insisted on motoring him down there for
the occasion. He had no idea of going to Chantilly, but was at Wimereux
when an entry form was sent along to him there, and he said to Mrs.
Gillies, "Let us go and watch the professionals," but they watched him
instead. He is always going to courses he has not seen, and when he has
not been playing golf for a long time, and then doing wonders on them.
Tall and athletic in build, in demeanour he is solemn, and I have heard
it said that his attitude at times somewhat suggests that he is about to
put his opponent on the operating table--which in a sense he often does.
He belongs to the hard thinking and slow playing school. Although he has
a keen temperament, and is a man who at his best plays largely from
inspiration, yet he is much of what we call a mechanical golfer, and is
very measured and deliberative in his movements. He has studied and
satisfied himself about what are the essential principles of this
mysterious game, and he applies them to the best of his intense ability.
He keeps himself steadier on his feet than almost any other player I can
recall. Those who have had the necessities of pivoting on toes drilled
into them from their first day at golf should make close observation of
the Gillies way and see how well that way pays. He swings his club
backwards but a little way and very slowly, but finishes the swing at
great length. As is often the case with players of his attitude towards
the game, his iron strokes are plain and they can be depended on.
But the most interesting feature of his system and his principles is the
remarkable steadiness with which he holds his head during the making of
his stroke. We understand very well that of all principles this is the
most imperative, and that he who disobeys it is completely lost. When we
have foozled we know well that the presumptive cause was a little
movement of that most restless and anxious head. We know also that head
movement disturbs the general balance, and induces body movement, and
have not troubled to consider why. A reason seems vaguely obvious, but
Mr. Gillies knows more about matters of the head than other people, and
from his surgical knowledge he has come by one of the most interesting
theories that have been propounded in connection with this game and
believes in it absolutely, which is one reason why he has decided that,
when driving, whatever happens his own head shall be absolutely
motionless. This is not a matter for a layman to explain or guess at,
and so I have gone to Mr. Gillies himself and begged from him his
theory. He says to me, then, that he has always felt that keeping the
eye on the ball is certainly the key to the situation, but in recent
times he has realised that the importance of so doing is really in
keeping still the delicate balancing organs of the head when executing
the shot. These organs or semicircular canals are intimately connected
with the eye, and also give one the sense of position. The least
movement of the head upsets the fluid in these canals, so that the sense
of position is more or less lost, according to the amount of movement.
Without the sense of position the stroke is almost sure to fail. "I take
it," he says, "that your visual memory is good enough to remember the
position of the ball, if you shut your eyes just before hitting it; but
if you move the head at the moment you cannot hit the ball correctly.
Swaying the head in putting, as Tom Ball does, is probably not very
disturbing owing to the movement being so slow that the fluid in the
canals does not get jerked. At the same time I can understand him
requiring a great deal of practice to perfect the sway." To the layman
this theory is very remarkable, and it is impressive for two reasons,
one being that it is backed by expert scientific knowledge, and the
other that it is emphasised by successful application.
* * * * *
And if Mr. Gillies is one of the most interesting figures that have
arisen in amateur golf in recent times, most certainly George Duncan is
the most interesting of the newer professionals. Here is an artist at
the game if you will, the greatest genius of golf that has come up since
Harry Vardon rose to fame. I am convinced that in the new period that is
beginning with the inevitable decline, to some extent at all events, of
the old triumvirate, George Duncan will be far and away the most
conspicuous figure. He is a great golfer, and is in every way admirably
fitted for supremacy. A more fascinating player to watch and study and
think about afterwards has never driven a ball from the tee.
When he first came out it was declared that he was the fastest golfer
who had ever lived. It was said that he walked up to his ball and hit it
away before anybody had time to realise that he had taken his stance. He
was likened unto hurricanes, lightning, and racehorses. I remember that
Mr. Robert Maxwell, being once partnered with him, in an Open
Championship I think, remarked afterwards that it was the most violent
and disturbing experience of fast golf he had ever known. All this was
true. Duncan never seemed to find it necessary to think as we do, and
not merely we with all our doubts and hesitations, but those far better
than we are, men who have won championships. He dispensed with all
alternatives, those fatal alternatives that ruin our own game. We often
fail because there are not only so many ways of doing the same thing in
golf, but because we try to think of too many of them when we have a
stroke to play and change from one to another and then to a third, until
our increasing indecision can be no longer tolerated and some sort of
shot has to be played. Analyse your own emotions and experiences, and
you will discover that this vacillation has been the cause of many
disastrous failures. But George Duncan never suffered in this way. He is
a man of lightning decision, of peculiarly sound and valuable
inspiration, and he is one who, having once decided, does not swerve
from his determination no matter what may be the allurements in the way
of alternatives. Duncan does not know the alternative. He has no use for
it. He does not recognise it. He believes that first thoughts in golf
are best, and he abides by them. He decides and he acts. And he does all
such thinking as is necessary for his decision while he is walking from
the place where he played his last stroke to the place from which he
will play his next, so that when he reaches his ball there is nothing to
do but get to business without any waste of time. All these were
features of the early Duncan just as they are of the present one, and
they have been developed and perfected during the ten or dozen years
that he has been out in the professional world.
But the Duncan of the early period had a fault of temperament in that he
would go wild. He would at the moment of crisis lose his head, think of
impossibilities and try to do them. He would lose his grip of his game.
Elation and despondency would alternate too quickly in his mind. He
would be careless; he would forget consequences. Who that ever saw it
will ever forget the way in which he let the Open Championship at St.
Andrews in 1910 slip from his grasp in that terrible last round? He had
done rounds of 73, 77, and 71, the third being then and still the record
of the course. Another 77 would have given him the Championship. Instead
of that he did an 83. The next year at Sandwich he did very much the
same sort of thing in his third round. It has seemed that in each of the
last four or five years he was good enough to win the Championship, and
that it was largely his own fault that he did not do so. That is why we
used to say of him that ambition should be made of sterner stuff, that
these weaknesses of his temperament were inexcusable and must be stamped
out.
Duncan has cured that fault of temperament now. He has stamped it out.
The other day when he and I were discussing his predecessor in the same
flesh, he said, "All that is past and done with. It is gone behind me.
There is no more of it. I am quick still. I shall always be quick
because that is I, Duncan, my nature. I cannot be anything else. And why
should I not be quick? Are there not too many slow golfers in the world?
But for the rest of it I am steady now. I feel hold of myself and the
game. I do not forget." Championships should come quickly to him now.