The Golf Courses of the British IslesDarwin, Bernard
History
The Golf Courses of the British Isles
Darwin, Bernard
Golf courses -- Great Britain
Provided we do not top our tee-shot into a formidable sandy bluff, the
eleventh should be done in four, with a chance of a three; and the
twelfth should be another four, if only we can be straight enough from
the tee. This is a hole to be approached warily and in instalments, and
the prudent man generally takes a cleek or a spoon from the tee, and
even then breathes a fervent thanksgiving if his ball lies clear, since
the fairway narrows down to a horribly small point.
The thirteenth, as I said, was once one of the very worst holes in
the world, and is now a thoroughly attractive one; the player must
produce some stroke whereby the ball shall sit resolutely down on a
slanting green surrounded by bunkers, and stay there. The fourteenth is
a two-shot hole for Mr. Angus Hambro, and rather more for most other
people, save under favourable conditions. Then comes another short
hole--I should have said there were four and not three--but this is
a long short hole; a wooden club shot is often needed, and when that
wooden club shot has to be held up into a stiff right-hand wind, the
difficulties of the situation are not easily to be overrated.
Then we face homewards with three good long holes, all of which may be
done in fours, though most people would thankfully strike a bargain
with Providence for two fours and a five. The most difficult of the
three, as is only right and fitting, is a seventeenth hole, and here
Mr. Colt has worked a great transformation and turned a hole that once
possessed no merits whatever into a thoroughly good one, with a most
difficult second shot--one of those shots which produce an instinctive
and fatal tendency to slice. After that two good, straight, steady
shots should get us safely on to the home green, and we have finished
at last; if we have done a score which is perceptibly lower than 80, we
have done well. If we have not been too frequently 'up to our necks'
in untrodden heather--nay, even if we have--we ought to have enjoyed
ourselves immensely.
From Sunningdale we go to =Walton Heath=--a thing far easier to
accomplish in the imagination than by a cross-country journey, and
there we have another fine, long slashing course laid out in the grand
manner, especially to suit the rubber-cored ball.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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