' What mighty ills have not been done by putting? Destructive, damnable, deceitful putting?'

So might the golfer exclaim, adapting the words of Otway, who was, I regret to say, ungallant enough to apply these epithets not to putting, but to woman. Of all the golfing arts putting is at once the most important, the most aggravating, and the most unteach-able. Its supreme importance no one with even the smallest experience of golf will be disposed to deny; one or two putts of merely dubious length holed in the course of a round often make all the difference between exhilaration and despair, and colour the golfer's recollections not only of his play upon the green, but of every other stroke that he played in the game. It is aggravating chiefly because it is so terribly uncertain. It is possible, though I admit it is exceeding rare, always to drive well, but the finest putter in the world is not only incapable of always putting well, he cannot be quite sure even of putting decently. Even if he does putt well, he can never feel certain that his opponent, usually an execrable performer on the green, will not on this one occasion putt far better. Nevertheless, the man who has deservedly earned a reputation as a good putter is one to be bitterly envied; he possesses a gift whose price is far above rubies.

I have called putting the most unteachable of the golfing arts, and by this I mean that a man must to a great extent puzzle it out for himself. There are of course certain things - indeed a great many things - that can be told him, but pure book-learning will be of less service to him in putting than in the playing of any other stroke. This is, I suppose, partly because the latitude that can be allowed the learner in respect to style is greater in putting than in other strokes, and partly also because there is no other department of the game which is to so large an extent mental rather than physical; wherein the most perfect style must be so utterly useless if only the brain wander or the nerve collapse. Yet never was there a greater mistake than in thinking, as some people do, that putting is purely a matter of nerve or will power, and that style is of no importance. In putting as in every other stroke, the golfer who has the soundest style will be most likely to retain his skill, under unfavourable circumstances. Moreover, those who make light of style in putting will, I think, observe, should they condescend to look, that good putters have in fact certain characteristics in common beyond that most important characteristic of all, the getting of the ball into the hole. Equally they will see - if they be not wilfully blind - hundreds and hundreds of players whose method is so obviously and hopelessly bad that nothing but a series of miraculous interventions can cause ball and hole to meet. Therefore the teacher, whilst admitting that much must depend on the learner's nerve and power of self-control, and whilst also insisting on the need of much wrestling in prayer and dogged practising, may yet give his pupil a good deal of definite advice as to the style and method of playing.

There are in putting, whether in approach putting or holing out, two main things to be considered. There is, in the first place, a preliminary calculation of the line and strength, and there is, secondly, the actual hitting of the ball. One eminent authority whom I profoundly revere has declared that 'the mechanical part of golf is comparatively simple,' from which it may be inferred that the really difficult matter is the preliminary calculation. That the latter is vastly important is proved, if need be, by the great care taken over it by all good putters, but that the 'mechanical part' is simple I respectfully but entirely deny. I would go so far as to say that anybody who could rely on the mechanics of his putting being permanently correct could afford to make some of the grossest errors of judgment, and yet probably be the best putter in the world. I will make so bold, therefore, as to begin with this mechanical part and let the line for the moment look after itself.

The player's first direct business is, I think, to learn to take the club backwards and forwards in the way it should go. In order to do this he must have a club and he must take hold of it. Wherefore we come to the questions of club and grip. As to the latter a good deal of latitude may be allowed, and the player, having already decided on his grip for other clubs, will probably be disposed to hold his putter in much the same manner. The one point that may properly be insisted on is that the grip should be a comparatively delicate one - touch in putting is half the battle - and that the club should be held mainly with the fingers. Whether the overlapping grip is used or not is in itself no great matter, but it may be pointed out that a number of golfers who do not overlap for the longer shots use this grip for putting, probably because it is essentially a finger grip: Mr. Hilton and Herd are two prominent instances. With much the same object, no doubt, namely the obtaining of a greater and at the same time more delicate control of the club, many players who, before the green is reached, coil their thumbs round the shaft, lay them down the shaft in putting. This plan would seem to make it rather easier to guide the club, and a player who feels naturally inclined to it will be wise to adopt it. There is one grip that deserves perhaps a special word of description, because it is, as far as I know, a purely putting grip, never used for any other stroke, and also because it is the grip of at least two very excellent putters. It may be called the reverse overlapping grip, a name which goes some way to explaining itself. As in the ordinary overlapping grip, the player holds his left thumb down the shaft, but instead of allowing the little finger of the right hand to ride upon the first finger of the left, he reverses the position, so that the first finger of the left hand rides upon the little finger of the right. It is a grip well worth trying, one of its chief characteristics being that the right hand is apt to feel and become the master hand, a state of things for which, as we shall see later, there is much to be said. Moreover, it is the grip of Mr. W. J. Travis, or at least was when he came, saw, and conquered us in 1904, and no more beautiful exhibition of smooth, true, accurate hitting was ever seen upon a putting-green. Mr. Herbert Fowler is another noticeably good putter who holds his club in this way; and Mr. John Ball also has from time to time flirted, if one may say so, with this grip, though I do not think he has permanently adhered to it.