"You 've just joined the club, Mr. Chapman ?"

"Only a week ago, Mr. Mott."

"Pretty nice course, don't you think? It 's very hard. It's harder by three strokes than any other course in the metropolitan district, and the fairway's a bit ragged, and the greens are pretty nearly hopeless; but you wait five years! I tell you, a man 's got to keep out of the rough on this course or he 's dished. I like a stiff course; it 's the only kind to have. Where did you play formerly?"

"Over in Boston-Kenilworth."

"Oh! Do you know George Horton?" "Massachusetts' amateur champion? I should say I do! Do you know George Horton?"

"Well, not exactly," said Mr. Mott, with some haste; "I 've heard about him. If he ever learned to putt, he 'd be a wizard, would n't he? Fore!" "You 're in the pit!" shrilled Mr. Mott's caddy.

"Well, don't tell me about it now!" roared Mr. Mott. "Excuse me, I thought you'd played. Well, of all the-" He saw Chapman's stinging brassy, which had threatened to sail into a grove of pines to westward, suddenly veer to the east, and drop lazily abaft the green.

"Pretty lucky," said Chapman.

"Lucky! I wish I had half your luck! I'd be playing Chick Evans in the finals. See my ball anywhere, caddy?"

"Well, Tell me

"It bounced over." "Humph!" said Mr. Mott. why don't you watch it, boy? it's in the pit, and then- Stand still, will you? Stop rattling those clubs! Say, I did n't see it at all."

"Neither did I," said Chapman. "It was against the sun. It sounded like a clean hit, too."

Mr. Mott shifted the responsibility to his faithful retainer, who was noncha

lantly chewing gum.

"Did you mark it, caddy?"

"Good Lord!" he snapped. "What d' you think you 're being paid for? D' you think I hire you to lose balls? Anybody can carry the clubs; your job is to watch the ball! Why did n't you mark it? That 'll make three I 've lost to-day, and you-"

"It's on," stated the caddy, chewing rapidly.

"On! Where?"

"Over by the sprinkler."

Mr. Mott coughed daintily, and looked at Chapman under his lashes. Chapman was n't on; Chapman was n't on by a good ten yards, but Mr. Mott was on in three, and the hole was a par five.

"I've got a chance for a birdie," he whispered to himself, "a chance for a four. It 's five hundred and ten yards, and I 've got a chance for a four. Good shot!" Chapman had clipped up neatly.

Mr. Mott took his putter, and made an awkward jab at the ball. It fled at a disconcerting angle. Mr. Mott flushed, and jabbed again. He lifted himself erect, and poured out into the world the offscourings of his innermost soul. He reviled himself, the Silver King golf-ball, the Vaile putter, the greenskeeper, the turf, the contour of the land, the Scotch who had invented the game, and the promoters who had organized the club. As an afterthought, he hurled the putter into a convenient hazard, and, seizing the first weapon which came to hand,-a niblick,-struck so fair and true that the ball went down for a six, one over par.

"Too bad!" said Chapman. "I missed an easy one, myself."

"I had a chance for a four," declared Mr. Mott, loudly. "Of all the rotten putting I ever saw in my life that was the worst. On the green in three, and three putts! These greens are rotten! Where my driver? Hurry up, there!"

's

in my eyes."

"There!" he ejaculated. "Now I'm

to the ground.

hit 'em right. But three putts, and only one over par at that! If our greens were as good as they 've got at Sleepy Hollow-"

He observed that his companion had again sliced, and by virtue of his own superiority of direction he was vastly exhilarated. The second shots, too, filled him with passionate glory, for he was safely over the brook, while Chapman had sliced into tall grass. Mr. Mott sidled toward his partner, and made diplomatic overtures of assistance.

"If you don't mind my telling you," he said, "you stand too far in front of the ball. You can't help slicing when you do that. You pull the face of the club right. across the ball. You 're getting good distance, but you slice all the time. Stand farther ahead, and you 'll be all right." "I certainly am slicing 'em," acknowledged the lanky man.

green and panted violently. "Four-and I'm on in five," said Mr. Mott, utterly innocent. "Where'd you go?"

"Just off-over by the water-pipe." "That is n't bad. One of you boys take the flag. Good work!"

"Sink it now," urged Chapman.

Mr. Mott tried to sink it, and missed by an inch.

"Throw that back here!" he ordered.

The second endeavor was flawless. Legally, Mr. Mott had taken two putts; morally, he had taken one. It was this consciousness of innate ability, this realization that if he had aimed a hair's-breadth farther to the left he would have sunk the first attempt that cheered and inspired him. And Chapman missed a two-footer!

"If you don't mind my telling you," said Mr. Mott, with admirable restraint, "you can putt a whole lot better if you turn the face of your putter over toward

"More like this," said Mr. Mott, illustrating. "Go back slower, and let go with your right hand at the top of the swing. And follow through more. Now, you take that last shot of mine; I hit three inches behind the ball, and the follow through saved it. It went as straight as a die. Say, are those people going to stay on that green all night? Fore!"

"Oh, they have n't holed out yet." "Yes, they have; they 're counting their scores. Some people don't realize there's such a thing as etiquette in this game. Fore!"

He topped into the brook. "Fore!" said Mr. Mott, waving his niblick.

He hammered the ball into a bank of yielding clay.

"Fore!" rasped Mr. Mott, setting his teeth.

He essayed a pitching stroke, a lofting stroke, an extricating stroke, and two shoveling strokes, and the last of these brought him to solid earth.

"Fore!" shouted Mr. Mott, wild-eyed. He ran an approach to the edge of the

"Listen! Three in the brook,-" Mr. Mott's mouth opened slowly, and his jaw fell,-"three in the brook," he repeated in horror, "and"

"And nine out, sir. You yelled 'Fore!' and counted five-"

"Give me the mid-iron," said Mr. Mott, abruptly. "Get down there and mark this shot!" He wheeled to gaze at the scene of his recent dredging operations. "Three in the brook, four, five, six, Hey! Stop swinging those clubs! Well, I said it was seven! Three in the brook-"

seven

"Your honor, Mr. Mott."

"Thank you." He teed for the short sixth across a threatening ravine. "Caddy, wake up there!" He turned to his partner with a gesture of Christian resignation. "Don't you wish," he asked, "that just once in a while you 'd find a caddy that showed some interest in the game?"

THE sixth hole was a trifling matter of a hundred and fifty yards; but to render it attractive to experts, there were mental, physical, and psychological hazards cunningly placed by nature, aided and abetted

few occasions of his attack upon this hole he had hooked over the stone wall, and he wondered dumbly how to prevent a repetition of the error. Instinct warned him to go for the hole, and play with assur

ARTHUR LITLE

by Donald Ross. As Mr. Mott wavered on the tee, he saw a deep gully, weedinfested and spotted with frowning rocks; he saw pits bounding and guarding the green; he saw trees and excavations and a stone wall. Upon its mound of sand he saw the Silver King waiting resignedly for its certain punishment. He saw his midiron, broad bladed and heavy, a club capable of propelling thirty pennyweight of rubber and silk an eighth of a mile if properly handled. Yet Mr. Mott discounted the inherent qualities of that iron, just as he discounted the elasticity of the golf-ball and the power of his wrists and forearms. He recalled that on the last

ance; but for several minutes he had n't been on good terms with his instinct. He struggled to revive the warnings of those who have written text-books, to remember what Haultain or Braid or Vaile has prescribed as antidotes for hooking tee-shots. "Stop talking!" he growled at the caddies. "How d' you think I can drive when you 're talking!" Out of the obscurity of printed words a phrase flashed to his brain, and he was aware that he was about to pivot on the head of the left thigh-bone, working in the cotyloidal cavity of the ost innominatum. He placed the mid-iron in position, and told himself that upon his life he was n't to move his right gastroc

nemius or sartorius except torsionally. He rehearsed, in one mad instant, platitudes affecting the right elbow, the eyes, the left knee, the interlocking grip, and the distribution of weight. He lifted the club stiffly, and brought it down again. Too cramped! He settled himself more comfortably, and peered at the stone wall. The green, half bathed in golden sunshine, half purplish in dense shadow, seemed to reach out yearning arms to draw the Silver King to its broad bosom. A hundred and fifty yards, par three. Mr. Mott caught his breath in a quick intake, and hooked viciously into the stone wall. "Oh, tough!" said Chapman.

But the features of Mr. Mott expressed no rage. On the contrary, he was smiling placidly, as a parent smiles at a wayward child. The crisis had come and gone; the most difficult obstacle of the entire round was now a matter of indifference to him; he had known positively that he was destined to hook into the stone wall, and he had done it. Even so, he did n't begrudge his partner that arching shot which spanned the ravine, and lacked not more than a yard or two of carrying the green; on the contrary, he was glad that Chapman had done so well.

"I always dub this hole," he said cheerfully. "I got a two on it last July, but ordinarily I'm satisfied if I get a four. You 're well up there; still a tiny bit of a slice, though."

"I'm working hard enough to straighten 'em out," deprecated Chapman.

"Well, if you take a nice, easy swing, and don't pull your body round, you'll get good results. I hope you don't mind. my telling you."

"Far from it," said Chapman, humbly. Mr. Mott's caddy pointed to the ball, which was virtually unplayable among the stones. Mr. Mott, now that he had crossed his Rubicon, was suddenly dogged and determined. It was all well enough to flub the drive, but this approach was serious business. He broke off a reed or two that interfered with his stance; he commandeered both caddies to assist him in the removal of sundry large rocks; he

man

bent the grasses so that he had a fighting chance to smash through with his deepfaced mashy. Down on the green Chapwas watching earnestly. On the sixth tee a fast-moving foursome was emitting comments which blew across the ravine, and caused the muscles of Mr. Mott's jaw to tighten significantly. Duffer, was he! He 'd show 'em whether he was a duffer or not! He focused on the flag, and swung the mashy in a wide ellipse.

Mr. Mott, by operation of that mysterious and extraordinary sense with which some men are sometimes gifted, had known with utter privity of knowledge. that he was sure to recover from the rough. What he had n't known, or remotely suspected, was that he would cover sixty yards with that vicious swipe, and lose his ball in the wilderness of the adjacent jungle. And even in that moment when he most concerned himself with the faultiness of the club and the defects of the ball he was n't nearly so much tortured by the necessity of playing three, still from among the stones, as he was by the necessity of allowing that cynical foursome to go through. His gorge rose at the mere conception of being passed; in match-play he would have conceded the hole instanter rather than suffer the ignominy of signaling a foursome to take precedence; but in medal-play he must finish every hole and hole every putt; so that he fretted impatiently for five long minutes, spoke to his caddy in curt monosyllables, and majestically expelled from the course, as a thief and a pirate, a soiled and tattered renegade who leaned over the wall and offered to sell him two secondhand floaters for a quarter. In days gone by Mr. Mott had bought perhaps a gross of balls from that same urchin, that boy who wearily spent the long summer evenings in beating thicket and brush for abandoned gutties; but to-day he looked mercilessly upon the scoundrel, and saw him for what he was, a trafficker in illicit wares, a golf-hound outlawed and thrice condemned. Besides, only yesterday Mr. Mott had purchased four balls from him,

and two of them were balls that Mr. Mott himself had lost last Sunday.

The foursome, completing their routine with incredible speed and skill, disappeared in the middle distance. Mr. Mott played three, and Mr. Mott played four, and if he had n't kept superhuman control over his temper, he would have dumped his clubs in the nearest pit, brained his caddy with a patent putter, and started incoherently for Bloomingdale. As it was, he merely confirmed the theory that the terminology of masculine hysteria is limited to four suffixes, and played five without caring whether he found the hole or the Hudson River. As a matter of fact, he found the hole.

"Bully!" said Chapman. "I made mine, too; thought we 'd better save time."

Mr. Mott, red and perspiring, shook his head sadly.

"I ought to have had a four," he maintained. "I wasted a shot. That 's eight strokes I've absolutely thrown away this round. I ought to have had a four easy. If you don't mind my telling you, you 'd better play straight for the big tree. Then your slice 'll make it come around into the fair." Whereupon Mr. Mott hit a very high, very short hook, and as he postured in the guise of Ajax,-save that Ajax presumably had no such costume and no such implement to intensify the dramatic value of his gestures,-he fervently apostrophized the wind, which had taken a perfectly straight ball and blown it into. a trap. He was n't influenced in his decision by the sight of a marker-flag drooping lazily on its staff, nor by the circumstance that Chapman's drive, which attained almost equal height, came to earth without a single degree of deviation from the line of shortest distance.

"The wind took it right around!" flamed Mr. Mott, snatching his niblick. "Fore!" It was a good out, and Mr. Mott played a goodly third. His fourth, however, was abortive, although the divot flew gracefully. Mr. Mott withheld his analysis until Chapman had curved a half-slice within striking distance of the green, and then his finer sensibilities prompted him

to disregard himself and to tutor Chap

man.

"That was a nice ball," he began sincerely, "but you 're still slicing. Why don't you try addressing it with the toe of the club? That makes you reach out after it. You try that, and see what it does. And I've noticed you go back too fast. You can't do that and keep your balance unless you 're a good player. Slow back, and crook your left knee more. Like this!" He foundered an approach which rolled and rolled until it trickled on to the green and stopped dead. "Well, that 's the idea, but I did n't get it up enough," said Mr. Mott with modest reserve. Subsequently they each used the putter twice.

The eighth was a sinecure, and they halved it in four. On the ninth tee, to the frank annoyance of another foursome which had overtaken them, Mr. Mott refused to drive until the quartet ahead had left the green, two hundred and twentytwo yards away, uphill.

"A good wallop 'll carry that far sometimes," he explained with dignity. "They 're off now, anyway." Before proceeding to the shot, he condescended to lighten the situation with a ray of humor. "I'd hate to kill anybody," he said, and topped not more than a mallet's length into the tall

grass.

From the restive foursome a gruff voice struck harshly upon Mr. Mott's sensitive

ears:

"Well, that was a damn' humane impulse all right!"

WITH a medal score of sixty-three for the first nine, Mr. Mott bade farewell to all thought of a silver trophy for his library, and devoted himself to a keen study of ballistics as exemplified by his partner's chronic slice. For two holes he fairly exuded advice and encouragement, but at the twelfth tee he was staggered to discover that he had counseled an ingrate. Without question, Chapman was improving steadily; the slice was appreciably less, and Mr. Mott had merely said, with the kindest of motives, that Chapman was improving, and that if he 'd only remember