e still at the same place, though a large club-room has
been added. That was the beginning of the Royal Jersey Golf Club. The
links as they were when they were first completed were really
excellent--much better than they are to-day, for since then, in order to
prevent the sand being blown all over the course by the strong winds
which sweep across the island, the bunkers have in most cases been
filled with clay, which has to a great extent spoiled them.

When everything was ready, more of these golfers came across from
England to play this new game which we had never seen before, and all
the youngsters of the locality were enticed into their service to carry
their clubs. I was among the number, and that was my first introduction
to the game. We did not think much of it upon our first experience; but
after we had carried for a few rounds we came to see that it contained
more than we had imagined. Then we were seized with a desire to play it
ourselves, and discover what we could do. But we had no links to play
upon, no clubs, no balls, and no money. However, we surmounted all these
difficulties. To begin with, we laid out a special course of our very
own. It consisted of only four holes, and each one of them was only
about fifty yards long, but for boys of seven that was quite enough. We
made our teeing grounds, smoothed out the greens, and, so far as this
part of the business was concerned, we were soon ready for play. There
was no difficulty about balls, for we decided at once that the most
suitable article for us, in the absence of real gutties, was the big
white marble which we called a taw, and which was about half the size of
an ordinary golf ball, or perhaps a little less than that. But there was
some anxiety in our juvenile minds when the question of clubs came to be
considered, and I think we deserved credit for the manner in which we
disposed of it. It was apparent that nothing would be satisfactory
except a club fashioned on the lines of a real golf club, and that to
procure anything of the sort we should have to make it ourselves.
Therefore, after several experiments, we decided that we would use for
the purpose the hard wood of the tree which we called the lady oak. To
make a club we cut a thick branch from the tree, sawed off a few inches
from it, and then trimmed this piece so that it had a faint resemblance
to the heads of the drivers we had seen used on the links. Any elaborate
splicing operations were out