The times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1897-1901, 1900-06-07
Golf.

They are having the golf craze in Sin "a
pore, and an apocryphal story. which ma.
nevertheless be true. is told in regard to
said that the climate is so hot that 1t is i'm
possible to keep the golf balls In condition
with any ordinary precautions; they have
to be kept on ice, like champagne or beer
The Chinese caddie, when he gees out II
the links, takes little bag of ice along, IL
which the balls are slowed. ii is not ex-
| planned what keeps the ice from melting
in the first five minutes.
When one thinks of beings sufficient!
crazy about golf 10 play it in climate
where the balls have to be trapped. it sug-
gests the idea that they might take OF
| their brains and Use them for halls. The
| size and toughness would be about right
heat would not affect such substance
and, apparently, the heads of these players
would be quite as well off without the
| brains as with them. But there is no ac-
| counting for tastes.
, What is there about golf that makes peo-
pie willing to imperil their earthly consti-
| tutions and their immortal souls by going
out and playing Il in the tropics? NOBODY
except the golfplayer knows. Gloomy
| non players allege that the game is an in
vention of satan, and that he is the only
person who can play it really well, having
had several eternities in which to learn
its principles. And no player has ever been
able to explain In just what its peculiar
fascination consists. II is not hilarious,
like jackstraws or croquet, in which the
fun has 10 be manufactured by wholesale
because there is SO little in the game itself.
Golf requires. apparently, all the attent on
theplayers have, and any attempt at jocu-
larity is frowned down as eternly as 1t
would be in a theological council trying 10
revise the Nicene Creed-in fact, more SO,
for the average clergyman is facetious
when he has time TO be. and the golfplayer
never is-about the game There is no
such lively interest in it as attaches 10
tennis, when one lucky stroke may win or
lose a match, and it has not the mathe
NAUTICAL exclrsiveness required for chess, or
the reckless daring associated with poker.
II is more like whist than anything else in
gard il. Some people take their whist al
most as solemnly as the golf clubs take
golf
1t is said that an old Scotchman once 60
berry asseverated that golf was not game;
1t was religion. Perhaps it is-to a
Scotchman. There are some kinds Of reli-
gion, manufactured in Scotland, which a:e
not much more cheerful or helpful than the
national game, and are about as difficult
for the outsider to understand But one
cannot help suspecting that the true in
wardness OF this faith is not apprehe ndei
by many of the members of golf clubs in
this country. There is too great a ten
dency TO dwell on the minutiae Of costume
and the perfection of dialect. Too much
attention is paid TO the particular kind o.
plaid affected by the fashionable wearer of
golf hose, and the especial style of d
sanctioned by the mode, and too little to
the game. Incalculable sums Of money
can be spent on properly constructed Links,
the right kind of clubs. Costumes which are
exactly the right thing, and so on The
observer is inclined to think that golf. in
this country, is simply new way of sp nd
ing money. So long as it is regarded in |
We're really to become popular game, we
might have a bitter political campaign on
account of ID.