Of the single-shot holes there is a fine long carry--the shot has to be practically all carry--on to the third green. The sixteenth is another that is good, and the course ends with an exceedingly difficult single-shot hole. There is in the minds of many a prejudice against finishing with a short hole, and it is certainly an ending which is not to be found on many good courses. Nevertheless, if the shot be only difficult enough, it is a little hard to see why a short hole should not make a really fine finish. There is an unpleasant feeling of finality about the tee-shot at any short hole, which never allows us to feel wholly comfortable, and certainly 'Hades' or the 'Maiden' would be infinitely more alarming if they came at the end of the round instead of in the earlier part of the round, when no mistake is irreparable. From the spectator's point of view, it is desirable to get the player to the eighteenth tee in the last state of nervous exhaustion, and a tricky, difficult one-shot hole accomplishes that rather inhuman purpose to perfection. Not far from Porthcawl--as the aeroplane flies--is another excellent course, Southerndown. It is perched high aloft and looks down on Porthcawl, amid the many other glories of a beautiful view. You may look out far over the sea, or again over a wide stretch of the best kind of English--or rather Welsh--landscape. The breezes blow cool and fresh here, and on a still and stifling August day, when the golfer is almost too limp to crawl round Porthcawl, he will be wise to refresh himself by a round on the heights of =Southerndown=. In one way the course is rather singular. Being high in the air and not down on the level of the shore, it has many of the characteristics of the typical downland courses. It has their big rolling slopes and deep gullies, but it has not, curiously to relate, the typical down turf. The winds of centuries have blown so much sand up from the seashore that they have practically succeeded in imbuing the turf of the downs with a second sandy nature. The sand does not go very deep down; indeed, if you dig far down you come to uncompromising rock; but this, so to speak, veneer of sand has a great deal to do with making the course the good and pleasing one that it is. An example of this blowing of the sand is to be seen in a huge sandhill, which forms a prominent feature of the landscape in the direction of Porthcawl. It has all appearance of a natural phenomenon, since out of the sand, where by all the laws of Nature there should be no trees, a fine clump of trees nevertheless persist in growing. The explanation apparently is that the trees grew first and the sand was blown afterwards in such quantities as entirely to obliterate the soil underneath. That at least is the story as it is told to me. [Illustration: SOUTHERNDOWN _Looking to the last green_]