The Golf Courses of the British IslesDarwin, Bernard
History
The Golf Courses of the British Isles
Darwin, Bernard
Golf courses -- Great Britain
Still if there are no little hills, there are, at any rate, some
alarmingly big ones, and the holes that we remember best are those that
are mountainous and more than a little blind. At the second, after
driving down a shaven avenue, we have an imposing second shot to play
over a big hill, which is made the more terrifying by two bunkers in
its face. The sixteenth is another fine slashing hole, where we have
to make a momentous decision, whether to try heroically for a four or
ingloriously for a five. In old days it was really a case of Hobson's
choice. It was hopeless to attempt to carry over that cavernous bunker
cut in the face of the hill, and there was nothing for it but to play
a dull, safe second, and hop over with the third shot. Now, however, a
short cut, a kind of north-west passage, has been cut through the rough
ground to the left, and two shots, perfectly steered and perfectly
struck, will see the ball disappear over the hill-top to lie in safety
on the big, flat green beyond.
These two are of the more flamboyant order of hole, but there are
others less imposing, but quite as good. At the eleventh there is one
of those uncomfortable tee-shots, which are so excellent. There is a
canal, a nasty, insidious serpentine beast of a canal, which winds its
way along the left-hand side of the course, and it is our duty, in
order to gain distance, to hug it as close as we dare; yet if we show
ourselves the least bit too affectionate towards it, this ungrateful
canal will assuredly engulf our ball to our utter destruction. To
push the ball too far out to the right is to make our second shot
unpleasantly long, and it is a hard shot, one that we desire to make
as short as possible. Bunkers guard the corners of the green, and the
putting is billowy and difficult; in fact, a four is far more likely to
win the hole than to halve it. There are plenty more good holes: the
ninth, a short hole, which demands the most accurate of iron shots, and
the fourth, with its green on a sloping, narrow neck among the hills.
The lies at Littlestone are flat and easy, but they will not be a bit
too easy for some of the shots we shall have to play from them.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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