What are really the least convincing examples of the practical value of
golf are the most effective in argument against such folks. With them it
may count a word in favour of the game that a man once playing it found
that his ball from a full drive came to rest on a sixpence which had
evidently dropped through a hole in the pocket of a previous player.
Here, indeed, was a material practical gain! They will be impressed also
with the possibilities of the game when they are told a little story of
how a man, who was not in quest of art treasures at the time, discovered
an old master accidentally, and entirely through the medium of his golf.
It was in this way. A Montreal art dealer was playing the game on a
country course one day in 1903, when he sliced a ball so badly that away
it went through the window of a cottage hard by. Thereupon there came
out from it an old lady, a French Canadian, who was possessed of
remarkable power of speech, of which the golfer was given much
evidence. Presently, when her attack was somewhat exhausted, the poor
golfer offered to recompense her for the damage done to the window; but
then it was put to him that the broken glass was not the only casualty.
The ball, after passing through the window, had continued its course of
destruction by breaking the glass that covered the picture; and without
making any examination of the nature of this damage the player agreed
that he would give a matter of a pound for the picture besides paying
for the broken window. This soothed the feelings of the lady of the
cottage, and she pressed upon him the picture, for the damage to which
he had paid so handsomely. He took it away with him, and at home in the
evening he was led in a spirit of curiosity to make some examination of
it, when, to his astonishment, he discovered that it was a Dutch
interior by Teniers, which he sold a few days later for £500. To the
credit of this golfer be it said, he sent a cheque for half the amount
to the cottager. This is an excellent story to tell to the absurd and
practical people, and a true one.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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