b should be taken, it will not generally pay to make
the suggestion at the time. The man naturally takes the club with which
he has most confidence and with which he believes he can make the shot
that is wanted. It is fatal to interfere with confidence of this kind,
and to substitute for it the hesitation and doubt which inevitably take
possession of the man when he takes in his hands a weapon with which he
rarely does well, and which, whatever you may tell him, he is convinced
is utterly inadequate for the purposes of the situation. Let each man
play the various strokes that have to be made in a foursome in his own
way without interference, for nothing but chaos and a lost match can
follow upon the enforcement upon each other of individual ideas and
methods.

This, of course, is not saying that each man should not play his game so
that it may fit as well as possible into that of his partner. He may
play with the club he particularly fancies, and play it in his own way,
but there should be some sort of a general understanding about what he
is going to do and the exact effect which his performance is likely to
have upon the way the hole is played if everything happens according to
programme. This makes it very desirable that the partners in a foursome
match to which any importance is attached, should have more than a
passing knowledge of each other's play, and of individual weaknesses and
excellences. One partner may be particularly good at making a fairly
full iron shot, but shaky indeed when it comes to a little pitch with
the mashie over the bunker that guards the green. It is clear, on
reflection, that the chief part in this playing up to each other's game
should be taken by the man who has the longer handicap, and is therefore
the weaker all-round player. The scratch man, being a wise and
experienced golfer, will naturally place his nervous 18-handicap friend
in as few difficulties as he can, and will constantly exert himself to
leave him a comparatively simple shot which he may be depended upon with
some certainty to accomplish in a workmanlike fashion. But the junior
player must remember that it behoves him to be the most careful and
considerate in matters of this kind, for in an emergency it is generally
the senior who must be depended upon to win the hole or pull the match
out of the fire. Let him, therefore, impose upon himself a considerable
measure of self-sacrifice, playing up to his partner for all he is
wo