But the most remarkable thing about his preparation for driving is his grip, which is unique. He does not employ the overlapper. He likes the right hand to be under the shaft; but this is the main point - that the first fingers are almost entirely free of the shaft, with the tips resting on the leather, curled inside the thumbs, Both thumbs are pressed firmly against the sides of the first joints of the second fingers, forming a locking device which prevents any possible turning of the shaft. He is an utter believer in this detaching of the first fingers from the club, and declares he could not play in any other way, his theory being that it permits better freedom of the wrists and enables him to get greater power into the stroke without deflecting the club-head from its proper sweep in the swing to the ball. With his driving iron he is a supreme master, and with it alone he has played a round of a difficult course in America, Montclair, in 77. When I watched him win his third championship I decided that in whatever else he might excel he had a finer temperament for match play than almost any other player I had seen. Silent, imperturbable, not a trace of feeling in his countenance, he seemed to be mercilessly forcing his way to victory all the time. Only once since he became established as a champion kind of golfer have his nerves ever failed him, and that was on an occasion of supreme importance, and yet one when the strain upon nerves was not, or should not have been, unduly severe. 1 saw him lose his match to Mr. Palmer at Sandwich in 1914, and there was something nearly as mysterious about that occurrence as there was about the victory of Mr. Ouimet at Brookline - far more than there was about the defeat of the latter at Sandwich by Mr. Tubbs, for then Mr. Ouimet simply played a poor but not a timid game. But in the Palmer-Travers match the American for the first time for years was afraid. Half way round, all the watchers were saying so, saying his nerves were catching at his shots. Knowing the man, having seen so much of him in America, I could not believe it then; but before the round was ended the truth was clear. His nerves had failed, and it was responsibility that had caused them to do so. He could not possibly have played so poorly otherwise. It was not the real Travers who played that day.

The middle-aged business-man golfer is an important individual in the general golfing scheme of things in the United States. He is that elsewhere, but he stands out most in America. Well enough does he know how the game is good for him. The early American goiters (those of from ten to twenty years ago) adopted the game enthusiastically, because it answered exactly to certain requirements they had in mind in regard to creating and preserving physical fitness. The American business man leads a quick life and a hard one and, in recent years particularly, his pursuit of this physical fitness has become something of a craze with him, for the reason that through it he seeks to bring the human machine to the highest point of working efficiency and, at the same time, enable the human man to derive more enjoyment and satisfaction from the pleasures of life. This is not a vague, subconscious idea in the American; it is a clear, definite scheme, adopted by thousands and thousands of those who have devoted themselves to the game. Hence their generous support and excellent enthusiasm. The country swarms with men, two-thirds way through an ordinary lifetime, who have only been playing the game for five or six summers and no winters - for in very few places in the northern parts of the United States is any play possible between the late fall and the spring - and who can play a good six-handicap game, British reckoning, for in America they have a system of handicapping according to which scratch is the lowest, and their six handicap is about equivalent to our two or three. The majority of our middle-aged men seem to resign themselves to the idea that in no circumstances can they ever become really good players, and they pretend they are satisfied to make their way round the links merely for the sake of the health and exercise that they obtain from so doing. Perhaps in a sense they are wise, but still it is certain that more than half of the joys and pleasures of golf are missed by those who never feel any improvement being made, who never rise above a steady mediocrity, and who never feel the thrills of playing above their ordinary form.

The business-man golfer is seen at his best at the country clubs near to the great cities. There is nothing elsewhere which for its healthy, honest pleasures and the satisfaction it yields is comparable to the American country club and the life that is pursued there. It gives to the busy man the ideal relaxation he could not obtain in any other way. I spent several days at one of these country clubs, a railroad journey of an hour or so from Chicago, and the experience was illuminating. The American business - man golfer works in the city for part of the day in the summer and spends the rest of his time at the country club, where the predominating features of the life are golf, rest, and sociability. These country clubs are provided with a large number of bedrooms, and are surrounded with cottages, nicely equipped, which generally belong to them and are let for periods to the members. The vitality of the man of whom we are thinking is enormous. He is out of his bed at the club at about six o'clock in the morning, and goes through a process of shower baths, with which the establishment is splendidly appointed. By seven o'clock he is dressed in the thinnest flannels, and sits down to breakfast with thirty or forty other members at 7.15. At this time he is jacketless, and all in white. A large glass of iced water is laid before him to begin with, and then the half of a grape fruit or a cantaloup, with a piece of ice stuck in the middle, is presented as the first course. These things, as we get them in America, are very delicious. At once an argument begins round the table about the qualities of different balls and clubs, and I am closely questioned about the way we do things in England. Next, there is oatmeal porridge laid before us, with tea or coffee, and the men begin to match themselves for the afternoon round. Mr. A says he will play Mr. B for a certain stake, but the latter finds he is already engaged to play Mr. C for a higher one.