Spirit of the links

I
ON AND OFF THE GAME 33
and we pass on the volume of his rules of life to all
those players who from time to time seek their
homes at night weary and depressed after a day on
the links, when all has been for the worst and despair
broods darkly over the soul. After all, the golfer
who is indifferent to the ills he sometimes, nay often,
suffers, and can in an hour completely forget the
tragedies of two rounds, is somewhat too phlegmatic,
and there will always be denied to him the higher
ecstasies by which the men of finer and more nervous
temperament are uplifted. We do not set it against
a man that when he has done discredit to his capa-
bilities, he should show many signs of inward turmoil
and display much active vexation towards innocent
persons and things on seeking his home. He may
rail against the arrangements of his household, and
he may appear peevish to the members of his family,
and find new faults in their manners and conduct.
If they are the kind, sympathetic people that they
so often are, they will bear with him and wait
patiently for the passing of the cloud. On the
morrow the good game may be back in all its fulness
and richness, and then at eventide there will trip
lightly homewards a happy and withal a penitent
golfer, who will not be slow to confess his fault and
to make a full measure of amends. The colour of
life will have changed from the dull grey to the red
of roses. And how much thinner and poorer would
be the days of our golfing life did they not contain
such constant change and yield to us such a variety
of emotion! But it is the days of sorrow rather than
the days of gladness that teach us the great lessons
that all worthy golfers should learn, and they should
not neglect the cultivation of the philosophic spirit
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