It is a maxim of Mr. Charles Hutchings that 'golf is nine-tenths mental.' A golfer who won the Championship when he was a grandfather has at least a long and ripe experience to draw upon, and in this case no one will question the general truth of his words nor quarrel over the precise numerator of his vulgar fraction.

Perhaps we are the more convinced of this truth because during the years of war we heard so much of 'moral' and the 'will to victory.' Fortunately it is still not regarded as correct to try to undermine our adversary's confidence by means of propaganda : we do not put in his way leaflets telling him how well we have been playing, and how kind we shall be to him if only he will let us win. We do, however, acknowledge more honestly than we did, that 'temperament 'has a great deal to do with the winning and losing of our matches. We admit that at some critical moment the nervous strain proved too much for us and that we 'cracked.' Once upon a time those who reported golf matches confined themselves to recording hits or misses without speculating very profoundly as to the cause; if a great player missed a little putt, he always did it 'unaccountably 'or perhaps he was described as putting 'slackly.'

Slackly - Heavens above ! when the poor man's muscles were so tense and taut that he could scarcely get them to move the club. To-day the reporter is much braver. He will insinuate that 'the fact that Mr. B. holed a long putt seemed to have an unfavourable effect on Mr. A.'s game.' Sometimes he will be quite ruthless and say that 'from this point Mr. A. went all to pieces.'

It is much better to speak honestly of these unpleasant matters and not shy away from them as if they were improper. By doing so we may in some degree improve our powers of control, just as by taking thought we may sometimes add a cubit to our drives. It is a subject on which I write as one, acutely conscious of having too much 'temperament,'who has not in his own case discovered a successful cure for it. I can only beg the reader to put out of his head all nasty unkind proverbs about people living in glass houses or of physicians healing themselves, and to regard me purely as a detached observer of other men's frailties.

There is one bit of advice the value of which no one would, I imagine, dispute - 'Know thyself.' A golfer may greatly strengthen his match-playing powers by trying and practising, but he can only do so by making the best of himself as he is, not by attempting to turn himself into quite another sort of creature. Not long ago I was watching a very good amateur player playing an important match. He looked extraordinarily calm and impassive: he walked after his ball and played his stroke almost as one sleep-walking. With me was one who knew this golfer very well indeed. 'so-and-so thinks so much,' said he, 'about making the crowd think that he does not care, that he sometimes forgets to hit the ball.'

That was a very astute observation, and it points out a danger in too consciously schooling ourselves. Very few of us can hope to look as supremely bored as Inman does when his opponent is in the middle of a big break. It springs from natural and inimitable genius. To drill ourselves in external points of behaviour is good in so far as it helps us to control the burning fires within us. No man, to take an extreme instance, can foam at the mouth and hurl his club after the ball and yet hope to be in a proper frame of mind for playing his next shot. But it is what is going on inside us that demands our main attention. Beyond a certain point it is only labour lost to put a mask upon our faces. It deceives nobody and distracts us from the main issue.

Knowing our own particular weaknesses, we must treat them with a combination of tenderness and sternness difficult to attain in exactly the right degree. On some points it is wisest to give way to ourselves. If, for example, we are trying to get into our best form for a particular occasion, the question arises of what sort of practice matches to play. Some people will thrive on a course of fierce fights against players as good or better than themselves. Easygoing games would only make them lazy ; the hard struggles tune them up without overstraining them. Certainly there could be no better preparation as long as they are quite sure they can stand it. On the other hand, some players, apart from not being physically strong enough, know that they cannot help taking their practice games too seriously, thinking too much about the winning or losing. They know that should they lose two or three times, even though they have played decently well, it will affect their confidence. If so they had better perhaps pander to this weakness, and administer to themselves the soothing syrup of a game or two with some nice feeble flattering old gentleman whom they are sure they can beat.

I remember some twenty years ago being at Westward Ho!, where there was then a large assembly of fine golfers. Perhaps I was trying to play in company too good for me. At any rate I was playing very ill and had utterly lost confidence. Mr. Hilton said consolingly to me,'Wait till you get to P.'(another course where I was going to play): 'you '11 be cock of the walk there and you '11 soon play all right again.'

That was not only an excellent piece of education for a young and foolish golfer, but a true prophecy. When I got to P. and was surrounded by-comparatively speaking-golfing pigmies, I began to play quite well and my lost conceit came back by leaps and bounds. Of course this form of treatment must not be overdone. I suggest it, for golfers of a certain type, only as the immediate preparation for a particular day. Generally speaking it would be fatal. I can think of one really brilliant golfer who, from a distaste for the fierce clash of battle, played so persistently with those far his inferiors, that when he had perforce to play a match on level terms he suffered the tortures of the damned. If we know our frailty in this respect, we must put ourselves resolutely in the way of being beaten and try not to 'get our tails down' over it. There are few things so destructive of the necessary belief in ourselves as having some one bete noire, a player who, judged by other standards, may be no better than us and yet always thrashes us. We must go on playing with him and not run away, and it is curious and consoling to observe how, if we do once beat him, fear vanishes. Very often the situation is suddenly reversed and it is he who begins to think that he cannot beat us.