Chapter III: Putting (2)

Cutting round a stymie is nearly always included in the chapter on putting, but it is practically always a mashie stroke, and in the majority of cases is a very short pitch with a large amount of cut. On account of the loft of the mashie the club gets well in underneath the ball, and as the head of the club at the moment of impact is travelling in a line which runs at a fairly sharp angle across the intended line of flight and run of the ball it imparts a strong _side roll_ to the ball. The cut on a golf ball in such a stroke as I am now describing resembles almost exactly the off-break spin in cricket. This means that the ball has a strong side-spin, so that the moment it hits the earth it endeavours to roll sideways, but the force of propulsion fights this tendency, and the resulting compromise is a curve which enables the ball to get round the intervening obstacle, and, if the stroke is well executed, to find the hole.

Almost all golf books instruct the player wrongly about this stroke. He is told to draw his hands in towards him at the moment of impact, and in some cases, even where the author calls his book _Practical Golf_, he is told to draw his hands in after impact. Both of these instructions are utterly wrong. There must be no conscious drawing in of the hands at the moment when one is trying to cut a put. All the cut must be done by the natural swing of the club across the intended line of run of the ball: in other words, the cut is a continuous process from the time that the club begins its swing until the time that it ends it. The fact that the ball is in the way of the face of the club as it crosses the intended line of run to the hole may be said to be merely an incident in the passage of the club head. Any attempt whatever to interfere with the natural swing of the club or to juggle with the ball during impact, or, more futile still, after impact, must result in irretrievably ruining the stroke.

The stymie shot which I have described will also be found of use a little farther from the green, and by means of it an excellent run-up shot, with most accurate direction, can be played. There is another way of negotiating a stymie which I have never seen described. It is pulling round a stymie. It will be obvious to any one acquainted with the game that cutting round a stymie is merely another form of slice; although of course the run of the ball is obtained in a different manner from the curve of the slice in the air, yet the method of production of the stroke is practically similar. So is it with pulling a put. There is no doubt that this can be done; but I think there is also no doubt that it is the most difficult method of negotiating a stymie which there is. The stroke is played, to all intents and purposes, as is the pulled drive. Some people imagine that it may be obtained by turning over the wrist at the moment of impact. This is quite an error, and is absolutely destructive of accuracy. As, in the cut put, the head of the club is travelling from outside the line across it, towards the player's side of the line at the moment of impact, so, in the pull, the head of the club must be travelling from the player's side of the line across and away to the far side of the line at the moment of impact. That is the secret of the pull either in the drive or the put.

I cannot refrain from quoting Vardon again. He says on page 148:

There should be no sharp hit and no jerk in the swing, which
should have the even gentle motion of a pendulum. In the
backward swing, the length of which, as in all other strokes
in golf, is regulated by the distance it is desired to make
the ball travel, the head of the putter should be kept
exactly in the line of the putt. Accuracy will be impossible
if it is brought round at all. There should be a short
follow-through after impact, varying, of course, according to
the length of the putt. In the case of a long one, the club
will go through much further, and then the arms would
naturally be more extended.

This is wisdom as regards the put. There can be no doubt whatever about this being practical golf of the highest order, but Vardon rather spoils it by the following sentence in which he says, "In the follow-through the putter should be kept well down, the bottom edge scraping the edge of the grass for some inches."

Now, if that means anything at all, it means that although Vardon's conception of the put and its execution in many ways is excellent, yet he has been making for years the error which made James Braid a bad putter--in other words, he has been putting with drag. It is well known that for a very long time Vardon's weakness was his putting; and I firmly believe that the secret of his bad putting was this low follow-through with his put. I think that Vardon's follow-through in his put is now not so low as it was, and the consequence is that his putting has improved.

Vardon continues:

It is easy to understand how much more this course of
procedure will tend towards the accuracy and delicacy of the
stroke than the reverse method, in which the blade of the
putter would be cocked up as soon as the ball had left it.

What is more natural, then, than that the blade of the putter should be cocked up immediately after the ball has left it? That is exactly what should happen in the perfectly played put. Vardon has already told us that the put is to be played with the "even gentle motion of a pendulum." Let us suppose for a moment that it was the weight of the pendulum turned side-wise which had struck the golf ball. It stands to reason that immediately the weight, which in this case answers to the face of the golf club, has struck the ball and sent it on its way to the hole, the face begins to "be cocked up."

Vardon here makes a totally erroneous claim. He claims greater delicacy and accuracy for the put played with drag as against that played as Braid now plays his puts. There can be no shadow of doubt that the put played with drag, or with a low follow-through "scraping the top of the grass for some inches," partakes much more of the nature of a tap than does the put which is played with top or a perfectly horizontal blow. If Vardon has not completely realised this, as I think he has, he will, ere long, do so, as James Braid already has done.

I need not here deal with complicated puts; that is to say, puts of such a nature that one has to traverse one, two, or more slopes on the way to the hole. These puts do not, in themselves, contain any of the fundamental principles of golf. Each one stands entirely by itself, and these are absolutely matters in which nothing but practice on the green can be of any use. It will be obvious to any schoolboy that if he has to run across five little hills on his way to the hole, and that three of these slant one way and two the other; and if we say for the sake of example that they are all practically equal in their width and slope, that it will be a case of four of them cancelling out on the good old plus and minus system of our schoolboy days, and we shall then be left practically to calculate how much we will have to allow for putting across the incline of one slope. This is not a case which I should think of giving myself. I merely give it because I came across such an illustration given in a book which is supposed to cater for those who desire the higher knowledge of golf, but as a matter of practical golf these situations but seldom occur.

Allowing for the drop in a green when one is putting across the slope, requires a lot of practice, and is most absolutely and emphatically not a thing that can be learned in an arm-chair, or in any golf school. It must be learned on the green itself.

Although James Braid has remodelled his putting with such success, he still, to a certain extent, clings to his own idea of putting with drag. On page 154 of _Advanced Golf_ he says:

For general use I am a strong believer in a putter having
just a little loft. I know that some players like one with a
perfectly straight face which does not impart the slightest
drag to the ball, their theory being that such putters are
capable of more delicate work than others, and that the ball
answers more readily to the most delicate tap from them.
There may be considerable truth in this, though, obviously,
great skill and confidence on the part of the player are
taken for granted.

And again he says:

The strength of long putts can generally be more accurately
regulated with a lofted putter than with a straight-faced
one.

He continues:

This is the kind of putter that I might recommend for what
might be called a medium or average green, if there can be
said to be such a thing; but I wish to point out that the
putter that is the best suited to such a green is not so well
suited to either a very fast green or a very slow one, and
that in each of the latter cases the club best adapted to the
circumstances is one with considerably more loft on it.

On page 56 he says:

Now in both these cases, when the greens are very slow and
when they are extremely fast, the best putter for them is one
with very considerable loft on the face, and it will often be
found that there is nothing better than a fairly
straight-faced iron, or an ordinary cleek, if it is big
enough in the face to suit the player. With this club and its
great dragging power, the effect seems to be practically to
reduce the distance between the ball and the hole. Such is
the drag that the ball is simply pushed over a considerable
part of the way, and it is only when it is quite near to the
hole that it begins, as it were, to run in the usual way. The
fact is that for the first part of the journey the ball does
not revolve regularly upon its axis, as it does when
approaching the hole, but simply skates over the turf, and it
will be found that with a little practice the point at which
it will stop skating can be determined with very considerable
exactness. When it does so stop there is still so much drag
on it that it is very quickly brought to a standstill. Thus
in both cases, of the very fast and the very slow green, the
ball can be played without fear right up to the hole when the
putter is so well lofted as I have recommended.

Here we are told that the ball "simply skates over the turf." As I have shown before, this is one of the greatest fallacies in golf. It is impossible to obtain any results by drag in a long put, which are not better obtained by simply rolling the ball up. Braid says that "with a little practice the point at which it will stop skating can be determined with very considerable exactness," and he goes on to say that "when it does so stop there is still so much drag on it that it is very quickly brought to a standstill."

This is obviously nonsense. It is the drag on the ball which makes it do any skating which may take place. It is obvious that when the skating has ceased the drag has stopped exerting its influence. How, then, is it going to stop the ball from rolling in a natural manner?

We see here the mistake of importing into golf the well-known phenomena of billiards, but one would have thought that the experience of the billiard-table would have been sufficient to show the fallacy of this statement. The billiard player uses drag to enable him to play his ball fast and accurately, and there is no doubt that by means of this drag he does obtain very considerable accuracy, but directly the ball has ceased to "skate" he knows that that is the time when the drag has entirely departed from it, and that the momentum has conquered the friction caused by the back-spin; in other words, the drag having accomplished its work has gone out of business, and all the run that is on the ball is derived from the remains of the momentum imparted to it.

I cannot say too emphatically that in my opinion this idea of putting with drag, or with any club having a loft more than that which barely enables one to see the face of it when it is properly soled, is dangerous and calculated to produce bad putting on the part of anyone who attempts it, even as it did in the case of James Braid himself.

There is one remark which James Braid makes about stymies which I should like to refer to here. Braid says: "Given complete confidence, the successful negotiation of a stymie is a much less difficult matter than it is imagined to be, though in the nature of things it can never be very easy." I must say that I differ entirely from Braid in this respect. I maintain that in the nature of things most ordinary stymies, when played in the manner which I advocate, are very easy. The difficulty of the stymie, provided one's club is properly built--and later on I shall refer to the construction of the mashie--is much exaggerated. Eight of ten stymies should present no more difficulty than an ordinary put. The only time a stymie should present a difficulty to the golfer is when the intervening ball is much nearer to the hole than to the ball which is stymied, so that the force required to get over the obstacle is so much that the player, after landing on the far side of the stymie, has too much power in his ball to give it a chance to settle in the hole, but even such a stymie as this may, if the ground be suitable, be overcome by lofting one's ball so as to drop on the hither side of the stymie, bound over it on its first bound, and continue on its way to the hole. This, probably, is one of the most difficult ways of negotiating a stymie; but as showing that it is eminently a matter of practical golf, I may say that I was illustrating the shot one day to a man who had practically just started golf. I showed him how to obtain the shot, and he did it at his first attempt. I advised him not to try again that day.

Braid continues:

I need not say that the pitching method is only
practicable--and then it is generally the only shot that is
practicable--when both balls are near the hole, and are so
situated in relation to each other and to the hole that the
ball can reach the latter as the result of such a stroke as
enabled it to clear the opponent's ball.

Braid is, I think, referring to a clean pitch into the hole, although the photograph leaves this open to doubt. The pitching method is practicable when one is stymied in almost any position on the green, provided always, as I have said, that one has any chance whatever of pulling up in time to get into the hole after having got over the stymie. Let me give an example:--Supposing my ball were fifteen yards from the hole, that the green was absolutely level, and that I had a stymie ten inches or ten feet in front of me. I should not hesitate for a moment to use the shot which I have described as the best stymie stroke in the game. The ball in front of me, so far from being an obstruction, or in any way whatever putting me off, would, if anything, serve as a good line to the hole. I am aware that to many golfers who do not know this stroke, and comparatively few do, this will sound like exaggeration. I am prepared at any time to demonstrate the practical nature of what I am writing to any one of my readers who cannot obtain the results which I get with this stroke.

At the time that I introduced this stroke there was much controversy about it, and it was claimed that it was not a new stroke, but that it was exactly the same as the stroke played by all golfers when stymied. This, however, is quite an error. Speaking of the stymie shot, James Braid says

... it is just an ordinary chip up, with a clean and quick
rise, the fact being remembered that the green must not be
damaged. To spare the latter the swing back should be low
down and near to the surface, which will check the tendency
to dig. The thing that will ensure the success of the shot,
so far as the quick and clean rise is concerned--and often
enough success depends entirely upon that--is the
follow-through. Generally, if the club is taken through
easily and cleanly, all will be well.

It is obvious from this description that the stroke in Braid's mind is totally different from my stymie stroke. With the stroke as I play it, it is an absolute impossibility to "dig" into the green. One has no need to have any anxiety whatever about the green, for as the club travels parallel with the surface of the green all the time, it is obvious that no damage can ensue. If there is any deflection whatever from the straight line, it would be at the moment of impact, but even here it stands to reason that there is practically no deflection whatever; for even in a stroke played, relatively speaking, so slowly as is this shot, any alteration of the line of the stroke after it has once been decided upon, is quite improbable, but the dominant idea in the player's mind must be to insert the front edge of his mashie between the ball and the grass, and above everything to keep his follow-through as straight and as low along the surface of the green as was his swing back. It is this straight and low follow-through which gives the ball its "quick and clean rise," as Braid calls it. Curiously enough, the follow-through which Braid shows for his stymie shot, wherein the head of the club is raised from the green, will not give anything like so quick a rise or such delicacy of touch as will the stroke played in the manner which I have described, and, above everything, with the very low follow-through insisted upon by me.

At the top of his swing in the drive. This is a fine
illustration of Vardon's perfect management of his weight,
which is mainly on his left foot. Observe carefully the
wrists, which are in the best possible position to develop
power.]

I may mention that George Duncan never uses any other stroke than this when playing a short stymie. Indeed, he went so far as to say, when I was having him photographed for my illustrations in _Modern Golf_, that it was useless to take any exposures of the ordinary stymie shot, for the stroke introduced and described by me had practically put it out of the game.

Speaking of cutting round a stymie, James Braid says: "Whichever way I wish to make the ball curl, either round the other ball from the left-hand side, or from the right, I hit my own with the toe of the club, drawing the club towards me in the former case so as to make a slice, and holding the face of it at an angle--toe nearer the hole than the heel--in the latter, in order to produce a hook." And he adds: "You cannot do anything by hitting the ball with the heel of your putter," to which I would rejoin, nor can you do anything by hitting the ball with the toe of your putter, that you cannot do better by hitting it absolutely in the middle, which is the only proper part wherewith to hit a golf ball.

In the illustrations Braid is shown cutting the put with an aluminium club. One has no more chance of cutting round a stymie with a club of this nature than one would have with a bar of soap, for the simple reason that on account of the breadth of its sole--for if it be not an aluminium club, it is at least shaped on the same lines--it is impossible to get the face of the club sufficiently underneath the ball for the loft to get to work so as to impart that side roll which is of the essence of cutting round. Braid says at page 171: "But remember that you can never get any work on the ball if the green is stiff." Now if this is so, I should like to know what use there is in attempting to put with drag?

I quite agree with Braid that it is practically impossible to get any work whatever on the ball with the club he is shown using. With such a club it would be still more difficult, if not absolutely impossible, to obtain any appreciable drag, but if, as Braid says, "you can never get any work on the ball when the green is stiff," how can he advise one to attempt to put with drag on a stiff green? To my mind this is absolutely bad and misleading advice.

In my chapter on the "Construction of Clubs" it will be seen that I advocate a short putter for short puts. In _Advanced Golf_ James Braid has some interesting things to say about gripping low down. He says:

Many golfers grip very low down, even half-way between the
leather and the head. If their putting when done this way is
first class, nobody can say anything to them, but if it is
not first class it may be pointed out to them that the system
is absolutely bad. It may be allowed to pass for holing-out
purposes; but for a putt of any length it cannot be good, for
the club is not swung in the ordinary easy manner by which
distance can be so accurately gauged. The ball is more or
less poked along. When a man putts in this way he is putting
largely by instinct, and even though he may generally putt
well, his work on the greens cannot be thoroughly reliable.
No putting is so good and consistently effective as is that
which is done with a gentle even swing, which can be
regulated to a nicety, and such putting is only possible when
there is enough shaft left below the grip to swing with.

I am quite in accord with what James Braid says about this method of putting, and I do not for one moment think that the short grip should be used for approach puts, but I am sure the nearer one gets to the hole the closer one should get down to the ball. Braid deals further on with the question of shortening one's putter. He says:

As to the length of the shaft, many players, because they
find that they always grip their putters a foot or so from
the end of it, proceed in due course to have the best part of
that foot cut off, or in purchasing a new putter they have
the shaft cut very short. Are they quite satisfied that it is
not better to have a fair amount of shaft projecting up above
the place where they grip when that place is very low down?

The answer to this is that in many cases the wood which projects above the grip is very much in the way of true putting. Any golfer who is foolish enough to cut anything like a foot off any club without any compensation to the head in the way of balance must be expected to pay the penalty for his ignorance, and anyone having a club constructed for him on such a principle, or, rather, want of principle, will inevitably pay for it. Braid goes on to say:

Often enough no consideration is given to this point; it is
not imagined that the shaft above the grip can serve any
useful purpose. Yet it is constantly found that a putter cut
down is not the same putter as it was before, not so good,
and has not the same balance; and, again, many players must
have been surprised sometimes, when doing some half-serious
putting practice with a cleek, iron, or driving mashie, each
club with its long shaft, to find out what wonderfully
accurate work could be done in this way. The inference from
all experience, having theoretical principle to back it, is
that the top or spare part of the shaft acts as a kind of
balance when the putter is gripped low down, and tends
materially to a more delicate touch and to true hitting of
the ball. A very little reflection will lead the reader to
believe that this is so, and in some cases it may lead him
towards a revision of his present methods.

Personally, I should not think that even "a very little reflection" would be necessary to induce anyone to believe that the top part of the shaft acts "as a kind of balance" when the putter is gripped low down, but it is quite obvious that it is possible to build a putter, let us say, for the sake of example, two-thirds of the length of an ordinary putter, which is just as perfectly balanced as the long club. This is not any question of theory--it is a matter of absolutely proved and tried practice in golf. One may have a perfect putter which will be ruined by taking a few inches off the shaft. The balance of that putter is probably irrevocably destroyed, unless, perchance, the owner is lucky in adding weight to the head in some way, but dealing with a putter like this is tricky work for one who does not understand it. The main point in connection with this matter of Braid's, which I have quoted, is that he gives a kind of qualified approval to the idea of the short putter for short puts. Personally, I think it is the soundest of sound golf, and I am inclined to think that before many years we shall see the shorter clubs used in their proper place when their value is more clearly understood.

Vardon has some very interesting things to say in his book, _The Complete Golfer_, on "Complicated Putts," while dealing with what he calls "one of the most difficult of all putts--that in which there is a more or less pronounced slope from one side or the other, or a mixture of the two." As he truly says, "In this case it would obviously be fatal to putt straight at the hole." He continues: "I have found that most beginners err in being afraid of allowing sufficiently for the slope"; and I have found that nine champions of ten make exactly the same error. It is as bad a fault at golf as it is at bowls to be "narrow," by which, in golf, is meant not to allow enough for the slope of the green, for it is obvious that if one is narrow one does not give the hole a chance any more than one does when one is short; so we may add to the stock maxim in putting "Never up, never in," another one, which is just as sound, "Never be narrow."

Vardon goes fully into the general principles underlying these complicated puts, but as I have already indicated, this is unquestionably a matter which can only be settled by practice on the green; but he also goes into the question of the manner in which the stroke should be played, and here we have a subject which legitimately comes within the scope of this work. He continues:

But there are times when a little artifice may be resorted
to, particularly in the matter of applying a little cut to
the ball. There is a good deal of billiards in putting, and
the cut stroke on the green is essentially one which the
billiard player will delight to practise, but I warn all
those who are not already expert at cutting with the putter
to make themselves masters of the stroke in private practice
before they attempt it in a match, because it is by no means
easy to acquire. The chief difficulty which the golf student
will encounter in attempting it will be to put the cut on as
he desires, and at the same time to play the ball with the
proper strength and keep on the proper line. It is easy
enough to cut the ball, but it is most difficult, at first at
all events, to cut it and putt it properly at the same time.
For the application of cut, turn the toe of the putter
slightly outwards and away from the hole, and see that the
face of the club is kept to this angle all the way through
the stroke. Swing just a trifle away from the straight line
outwards, and the moment you come back on to the ball draw
the club sharply across it. It is evident that this movement,
when properly executed, will give to the ball a rotary
motion, which on a perfectly level green would tend to make
it run slightly off to the right of the straight line along
which it was aimed.

There are one or two points in this statement which are of very great importance. Vardon says: "For the application of cut turn the toe slightly outwards and away from the hole, and see that the face of the club is kept to this angle all the way through the stroke." This is absolutely unsound golf, for Vardon is advising his reader to play the put with the toe of the putter slightly outwards and away from the hole. It stands to reason that following this advice will put the face of the club in such a position that at the moment of impact it will be impossible for it to be at a right angle to the intended line of run to the hole, and this rule is, for all purposes of practical golf, invariable. It is obvious that coming on to the ball in the manner suggested must tend to push it away to the right--that is to say, it would have a strong tendency to go away to the right from the very moment of impact, which is not what is generally wanted in a good put; also playing the put in this manner tends quite naturally to decrease the amount of cut put on it. The idea that cut mashie shots and cut puts are played in this manner has arisen from the fact that very frequently the golfer addresses the ball with the toe of his club laid back a little, but by the time he has come on to the ball again he has corrected this. In many cases, if it were not for laying the toe of the club back a little in this manner, golfers would be inclined, although as a matter of strict and accurate golf they should not be, to drag the ball across towards the left of the hole.

Vardon says: "Swing just a trifle away from the straight line outwards, and the moment you come back on to the ball draw the club sharply across it." Now here again we see this outstanding error of practically every man who ever put pen to paper to write about golf, which is that in producing the cut, whether it be in a put or a sliced drive, something is done intentionally to the ball during the period in which the ball and the club are in contact. This is absolutely wrong. I have explained before that the cut put, and indeed all cut strokes at golf, are produced by the club swinging across the intended line of flight or run at the moment of impact, and the amount of cut depends entirely upon the angle and the speed at which the club head is travelling across the intended line of flight or run. It is obvious that the amount of cut must also, to a certain extent, depend on the amount of loft of the club, for the greater the loft of the club the greater assistance will the golfer who is applying the cut obtain from the weight of the ball.

Vardon goes on to say: "It is evident that this movement, when properly executed, will give to the ball a rotary motion, which on a perfectly level green would tend to make it run slightly off to the right of the straight line along which it was aimed"; but as I have already shown, the unfortunate part of it is that a put so played would not go down the straight line which every golfer desires that his put shall go on; nor indeed on anything like it.

Also it is a delusion that it is possible with any of the ordinary putters to obtain a cut of a sufficiently pronounced degree to remain on the ball, especially on the bramble balls, for any appreciable distance. Vardon supposes a case of a steep but even slope all the way from the ball to the hole, and he gives instructions as to how to put across this slope with cut so as to hold the ball up against the slope. He says:

But we may borrow from the slope in another way than by
running straight up it and straight down again. If we put cut
on the ball, it will of itself be fighting against the hill
the whole way, and though if the angle is at all pronounced
it may not be able to contend against it without any extra
borrow, much less will be required than in the case of the
simple putt up the hill and down again.

In the first place, I may remark that we do not generally borrow from a slope "by running straight up it and straight down again." The path of the ball is generally, almost from the time it is hit, a curve, and a gradual curve, in which one sees to it that the ball is at its farthest from the straight line to the hole somewhere about midway to the hole. But this idea of putting cut on the ball with a putter, which is sufficient to hold the ball up against the hill for any appreciable distance, is practically a delusion. I can easily understand that if Vardon plays the cut put as he himself directs it to be played, that he thinks that cut administered to a ball by an ordinary putter may have a very great effect in holding the ball up against the side of a hill for a considerable distance, but this really is not so. Putting, however, as Vardon instructs one to put for obtaining cut, would in itself punch the ball up against the slope of the hill, and I can easily believe that anybody who plays the put like this, thinking that he is obtaining cut by so doing, will be under the impression that cut is a very useful thing for holding the ball up against the slope in this manner, whereas he is in effect simply punching the ball up against the slope--in other words, he is playing a put, which if the green were perfectly level, would be yards off his line to the hole and to the right of it.

Vardon goes on to say:

Now it must be borne in mind that it is a purely artificial
force, as it were, that keeps the ball from running down the
slope, and as soon as the run on the ball is being exhausted
and the spin at the same time, the tendency will be, not for
the ball to run gradually down the slope--as it did in the
case of the simple putt without cut--but to surrender to it
completely and run almost straight down.

There is a fundamental error here, for Vardon states that practically the spin on the put and the run on the ball will be exhausted at the same time, but it is an utter impossibility to calculate with any exactness whatever as to what happens in such a case. Vardon knows no more about it than any other golfer, and all that any golfer knows about this is extremely little, so that to advise anyone to attempt to hold his ball up against a slope by the application of cut with any ordinary putter, particularly a broad-soled putter, is to invite him to play his shot blindfolded.

Vardon does not mention the length of the put which he considers it possible to play with this cut, but in his diagram he shows a put which would conceivably be quite a long put, let us say for the sake of argument fifteen or sixteen feet, but the theory would be just as bad if it were much less. He says:

Our plan of campaign is now indicated. Instead of going a
long way up the hill out of our straight line and having a
very vague idea of what is going to be the end of it all, we
will neutralise the end of the slope as far as possible by
using the cut and aim to a point much lower down the
hill--how much lower can only be determined with knowledge of
the particular circumstances, and after the golfer has
thoroughly practised the stroke and knows what he can do with
it. And instead of settling on a point half-way along the
line of the putt as the highest that the ball shall reach,
this summit of the ascent will now be very much nearer the
hole, quite close to it in fact. We putt up to this point
with all the spin we can get on the ball, and when it reaches
it, the forward motion and the rotation die away at the same
time, and the ball drops away down the hill, and, as we hope,
into the hole that is waiting for it close by.

Vardon may well say "as we hope," for the put described by him has no more chance of being brought off on a putting-green than Vardon has of winning another open championship from an aeroplane. To speak of putting a ball in this manner, and treating it with such magic that when it gets up by the hole the forward motion and the rotation die away at the same time, is not practical golf, but absolute moonshine, for it would be an utter impossibility to persuade any golf ball which has ever been made to receive from any known form of golf club sufficient cut to make it behave in the manner described. The theory of the thing on paper is to a very great extent right, with the exception that the cut described would require to be obtained by a club with a much greater loft than any ordinary putter; but it is evident that putting with putters such as those which Braid or Vardon use, it would be an utter impossibility to get cut on the ball which would stay with the ball during a long put and exert much influence in holding the ball up against any appreciable slope, for with these putters, which have not much loft, it is evident that any spin whatever which is imparted to them by drawing the putter across the line of run at the moment of impact will be mainly about a vertical axis which is, in effect, the spin of a top. It is evident that as the ball progresses across the green there will be a very strong effort indeed on the part of the ball, following its friction on the green, to wear down this vertical motion and convert it into the ordinary roll of a naturally hit put.

Even when one is putting with a highly lofted club and with a tremendous amount of drag on a perfectly flat green, the drag goes off the ball in a wonderfully short space of time, and here, of course, one is using a spin which is analogous to the drag of the billiard player, for it is pure back-spin which is fighting in the same plane the forward roll of the golf ball. Therefore it is reasonable to suppose, and indeed it is undoubted that the ball would be more likely to retain this pure back-spin for a much longer time than would the ball with the side-spin imparted by the putter, for the spin which is imparted by the putter does not directly fight the forward progress of the ball as it is spinning across the plane of the roll which the ball desires to take, whereas, as I have before pointed out, the ball played with drag is absolutely fighting the forward roll of the golf ball. It therefore would for a very short distance skid over the putting-green, but those who only theorise about these matters have a ridiculously exaggerated idea of the influence of drag on the golf ball.

I have made it very plain, and I cannot emphasise the matter too strongly, that any attempt whatever in long puts to use drag or cut of any kind is to be deprecated.

There is another matter which Vardon refers to that I should like to notice here. He says:

One of the problems which strike most fear into the heart of
the golfer is when his line from the ball to the hole runs
straight down a steep slope and there is some considerable
distance for the ball to travel along a fast green. The
difficulty in such a case is to preserve any control over the
ball after it has left the club, and to make it stop anywhere
near the hole if the green is really so fast and steep as
almost to impart motion of itself. In a case of this sort I
think it generally pays best to hit the ball very nearly upon
the toe of the putter, at the same time making a short, quick
twitch or draw of the club across the ball towards the feet.
Little forward motion will be imparted in this manner, but
there will be a tendency to half lift the ball from the green
at the beginning of its journey, and it will continue its way
to the hole with a lot of drag upon it. It is obvious that
this stroke, to be played properly, will need much practice
in the first place, and judgment afterwards, and I can do
little more than state the principle upon which it should be
made.

I need hardly do more here than repeat what I have said in the case of the other puts. Any attempt to jump a ball at the beginning of the put on a steep, fast green is about as bad a method of starting it as one could possibly imagine. There is nothing for it but the smooth, steady roll. Few greens, of course, are so steep that the ball will run off them unless it has been very violently played, so the ordinary principles of putting still hold good here--there is one way to play that put, and that is not from the toe, but from the centre, of the club, and as straight as may be for the hole, having due regard to the slope or slopes of the green. Of course, as I have before indicated, if one is very near to the hole, certainly not more than two to three feet at the utmost, one may be excused for putting straight at the hole with drag, because a ball can be made to carry its drag for about this distance.