In its ancient days the Royal and Ancient Golf Club of St. Andrews was great on fines in wine. It promoted conviviality on every possible occasion, and, indeed, one of the first of its minutes that are now discoverable says, under date 4th May 1766, "We, the Noblemen and Gentlemen subscribing, did this day agree to meet once every fortnight, by Eleven of the clock, at the Golf House, and to play a round of the links; to dine together at Bailie Glass', and to pay each a shilling for his dinner - the absent as well as the present." It was some two or three years after this that means were devised for augmenting the dinner wine through the various social delinquencies of members. Thus, on 4th September 1779, a resolution is passed as follows: "It is enacted that whoever shall be Captain of the Golf, and does not attend all the meetings to be appointed throughout the year, shall pay Two Pints of Claret for each meeting he shall be absent at, to be drunk at such meeting; but this regulation is not to take place if the Captain be not in Fife at the time." Many years later, in 1818, the wine tax on absentees was applied to members generally, under interesting circumstances, as indicated in the terms of the resolution that was passed, which read: "The Club, taking into consideration that the meetings have of late been thinly attended by the Members residing in town, in consequence of several members giving parties on the ordinary days of meeting, and thereby preventing those who would otherwise give their presence at the Club, from attending them, Do Resolve, that in future such Members as shall invite any of their friends, Members of this Club, to dinner on the days of meeting, shall forfeit to the Club a Magnum of Claret for himself, and one bottle for each Member so detained by them, for each offence, and the Captain and Council appoint this Resolution to be immediately communicated to General Campbell." On 16th September 1825 a minute is entered, "Which day the present Captain, having imposed on himself a fine of a Magnum of Claret for failure in public duty, imposed a similar fine on the old Captains present." It is quite evident that in these rich old days the social side of golf was cultivated in a manner that makes the worthiest efforts in this direction in the twentieth century look mean in comparison.

The men of the old Musselburgh Club were great in conviviality. Here is a remarkable entry taken from their minute-book: "Musselburgh, I ith January 1793. - The Club met according to adjournment. The meeting was so merry that it was agreed that matching and every other business should be delayed till next month."

On 1 ith May 1798, when the Club held its meeting, the question was put as to whether the funds should be disposed of by the members present or delayed till the December meeting, when it was resolved by a majority that the company then present should determine it. Thereupon it was put to the vote as to whether the funds should be drunk, or part of them taken to "give their Myte to the Voluntary Subscription in aid of the Government," and it was carried unanimously that Five Guineas should be sent to this fund in the name of the Club, and that the remainder of the funds should be disposed of at the December meeting. Meeting at Moir's on 16th February 1810, the members "Resolve, That an annual subscription of One Guinea be paid by each member, from which fund the expense of the dinners is to be in future defrayed, but all the expenses of liquors to be defrayed by the company present. And any overplus at the end of each season to be sunk in a General Gaudeamus."

The old records of the Bruntsfield Links Golf Club are similarly entertaining. On 27th April 1822, "Captain Kilgour informed the meeting that Mr. Williamson had sent a small cask of spirits of his own manufacture as a present to the Club. The Secretary was ordered to transmit the thanks of the Society to Mr. Williamson, and to inform him that he was unanimously elected an Honorary Member." On 29th June 1842 we are told that "a very large party dined at Cork's, and the evening was spent with more than stereotyped happiness, harmony, and hilarity. A number of matches were made. Mr. S. Aitken (not, of course, when madness ruled the hour) pledged himself if, and when, Deacon Scott married, to present to the Club half a dozen of wine, and the like quantity to the object (lovely, of course) of his choice! This happy evening ' through many a bout of linked sweetness long drawn out,' partook of the transitory nature of all earthly things, and, as one of of our poets says, broke up!"

After the meeting of the Bruntsfield members on 17th December 1842, "A large party dined at Goodman's, and spent a very happy evening, not the less so that some member, to the company unknown, made the handsome present of half a dozen of Champagne. Mr. Brown, after some very apposite remarks, read an interesting paragraph from the Bombay Times of the 19th October last, noticing certain proceedings of a Golf Club formed in the East Indies, which gave rise to much felicitous discussion, and the appointment of a deputation, consisting of the Captain and Mr. Paterson, to meet and compete with the like, or any number of the Indian Club, the deputation to travel at the Club's expense and by the new Aerial Transit, which is expected to start 20 early in February next." They were in a happy mood that evening.

The minutes record that on 18th October 1845, "The Club dined in the Musselburgh Arms Inn, and spent a very happy evening; but the meeting having been prolonged beyond the period at which the omnibus (in which seats had been taken) started, the members found it necessary to walk the greater part of the way to town."

Rich, indeed, were those ancient days of golf!

XI

And so, heigho! another full year of golf has run to its end, and we come to pause for a little while to reflect upon the new chapter that has been added to the long happy story of our play; for, indeed, it is true of us golfers, as it is of others, that "we spend our years as a tale that is told." For some days now the links which have served us so faithfully and so well during all this year, have been at rest, asleep. Nature, the gentle considerate nurse, sometimes comes to the help of these precious acres of green turf in that season when their lot is the least happy, fending away us tyrant masters while she lays them to repose and wraps up each teeing ground and putting green and all the way between in the thick mantle that she weaves herself. Perhaps the players do not always know that the grass welcomes this snow, and is not, as they might imagine, stifled with it and reduced to such unconsciousness as to be near the point of death. The snow both nourishes and warms the worn-out turf - collects and holds down for its sustenance all the available nitrogen in the atmosphere, and then covers it with that thick cloak which generates only warmth beneath. Presently, when the frosts cease and the snow melts and the grass lies bare again, those who have recollection enough for the comparison will see that it is greener and stronger than it was before. When there is a championship in prospect on St. Andrews links, the wise and good greenkeeper there beseeches kind Nature that of her infinite variety she will vouchsafe to his little patch of earth for some several days of winter a heavy fall of snow, that in due course he may better serve up to his master golfers a links of such perfection of order as will please them to the utmost. What shall he care if the old grey place is beleaguered by these storms of snow, if the Swilcan Burn is almost covered up, and if it would be as much as the life of the captain of the Royal and Ancient Club were worth to try to find the line to the Long Hole? Hush, you grumbling golfers! The old course, weary, is at rest; and patiently will the happy greenkeeper wait for its awakening. There is something of pathos in the time and the scene, as: