They seem to have a lofty-minded idea that there is something not quite right about putting the ball on a high tee--that it is rather on a par with potting the white at billiards. It is splendid of them to have such fine and noble ideals, but it would be to their practical advantage to forget them now and then. And I am quite sure that the ladies, as a rule, do not take the pains they should about their putting and the short game generally. There is but one of them, Miss Grant Suttie, so far as I have seen, who really studies her putts as a good man player studies them, and that is because she has played so much with men at North Berwick and has adopted their methods. She has her advantage therein, for she is the most certain on the green of all the ladies. It is a wonder, seeing that it is a part of the game which demands delicacy of touch and no strength of muscle, that ladies do not putt far better than men. As a general rule they putt far worse. Naturally, when this incursion of the ladies arrived on the links of the men, it intensified the trouble of those problems of the congestion of the green which were already beginning to be acute. Naturally, too, men dealt with the incursion according to their powers and according to their gallantry. No doubt it was felt that it was a hard and discourteous thing to deny the ladies equal rights, even over the private courses. Obviously, on the public courses they had the equal right, and they were not shy of claiming it. On the private courses we used to hear at first, "It's absurd, these ladies not sticking to their own course: they can't drive far enough to be able to appreciate the long course," and so on. But then it very soon became evident that they could drive further and play better than a large number of the male members of the Club, which rather knocked the bottom out of that argument. As a rule some compromise was effected, the ladies being restricted to certain hours--after all, the men were generally workers, so that they had the more claim to have the course at their disposal in their hours of leisure. A very good form of compromise is that which is in vogue at Biarritz, and it may be commended to the notice of other Clubs. There is one afternoon in the week set apart for all and sundry ladies, but besides this there is a permission for ladies whose handicap is four or under to play at any time and on equal terms with the men. This seems to meet the case admirably, for it keeps off the links the inefficient lady players who would be apt to block the green and whose right place is their own short course, while it freely admits those who are capable of appreciating the blessings of the long course and are quite as good golfers as the average of the men whom they will meet there. As time goes on it appears as if we shall be fortunate if the ladies do not take exclusive possession of the links, and only allow us men upon them at the hours which are the least convenient. CHAPTER XXVII