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The man of thirty in a few years will very likely develop into a really bad putter, not because he has not the skill-for he proved his skill when a beginner-but because he has learnt the terrors of putting, and his skill is overpowered by his nerves. To prove how much nerve is the first, second, and third necessity in putting, you may take a man of thirty years old who has been and perhaps still is a good cricketer, and has a good eye for games generally. He has lost some of his length, he cannot force a ball out of its bunker as he did formerly, and his eye is not quick at judging the distance of about eighty yards which he has to carry to get over some danger. One spiky blade of grass may make all the difference in laying a ball dead or holing it, and the eye cannot always be depended on to see such things.

In one sense it was refreshing for an ordinary mortal to see great men fail in the way they did, for we could all flatter ourselves we could quote this instance as a proof of how hard putting was, when we failed ourselves. But in this case the putting of both these distinguished players was never "up"; they failed where nearly every player who is "off" his putting fails; they were short. Still, I think, on the whole, increasing age does carry some compensation for golfers; and I believe that when a man has played some years, and his handicap, may be, is brought from scratch to three, it is often found that his short game, especially his putting, is rather improved than otherwise. If you don't want to talk yourself you can be as dumb as a drum with a hole in it, as Sam Weller says, and you may go farther, and forbid anybody to speak to you; but to stamp and swear because somebody within hearing distance of you chooses to talk to a friend is ridiculous and silly, partly because it is contemptible, and partly because, as you are not in a position to stop all conversation on the links, you must grin and bear it.

There can be no doubt that golf is terribly trying to a man. You can do this far more easily at billiards than you can at golf. I have played many games in my time, but I confidently say that for a test of nerve, golf is far the most trying game in the world, and next to it billiards. There is another reason why golf is a greater test of nerve than billiards, and that is the variety of weapons that you must have for different strokes. If strength or the consideration of strength be the chief cause of nervousness, billiards ought therefore to be more of a test of nerve than golf. But when you are fifty yards from the hole, and a bunker yawning between you and it, or when you have to lay an approach putt of twenty yards more or less dead to win or halve a hole, then the question of nerve becomes everything, because strength is everything.

But putting has to be gone through every hole, and no golfer exists who does not know that putting is more than half a matter of nerve and nerve only. I have seen a player who was bad at lofting a ball over a bunker forty yards from the hole, play the previous stroke short in order, instead of having to play a forty-yards shot, to make one that took eighty yards to get over the bunker. In the same way you may go round a hazard instead of trying to get over it. High-quality balls should be perfectly round and have consistent weights throughout the set. This shot involves striking the cue ball in a way that it contacts multiple balls consecutively before pocketing the intended target ball. There are 18 balls in this game and one white cue ball, which is the only ball the cue ever contacts.

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