'Keep the head still--slow back--don't press,' I said, gravely. There
is no better rule for a happy and successful life.
'It's nothing to do with golf this time,' he said. 'It's about the
treasurership of my company. Old Smithers retires next week, and I've
got to find a man to fill his place.'
'That should be easy. You have simply to select the most deserving from
among your other employees.'
'But which is the most deserving? That's the point. There are
two men who are capable of holding the job quite adequately. But then I
realize how little I know of their real characters. It is the
treasurership, you understand, which has to be filled. Now, a man who
was quite good at another job might easily get wrong ideas into his
head when he became a treasurer. He would have the handling of large
sums of money. In other words, a man who in ordinary circumstances had
never been conscious of any desire to visit the more distant portions
of South America might feel the urge, so to speak, shortly after he
became a treasurer. That is my difficulty. Of course, one always takes
a sporting chance with any treasurer; but how am I to find out which of
these two men would give me the more reasonable opportunity of keeping
some of my money?'
I did not hesitate a moment. I held strong views on the subject of
character-testing.
'The only way,' I said to Alexander, 'of really finding out a man's
true character is to play golf with him. In no other walk of life does
the cloven hoof so quickly display itself. I employed a lawyer for
years, until one day I saw him kick his ball out of a heel-mark. I
removed my business from his charge next morning. He has not yet run
off with any trust-funds, but there is a nasty gleam in his eye, and I
am convinced that it is only a question of time. Golf, my dear fellow,
is the infallible test. The man who can go into a patch of rough alone,
with the knowledge that only God is watching him, and play his ball
where it lies, is the man who will serve you faithfully and well. The
man who can smile bravely when his putt is diverted by one of those
beastly wormcasts is pure gold right through. But the man who is hasty,
unbalanced, and violent on the links will display the same qualities in
the wider field of everyday life. You don't want an unbalanced
treasurer do you?'
'Not if his books are likely to catch the complaint.'
'They are sure to. Statisticians estimate that the average of crime
among good golfers is lower than in any class of the community except
possibly bishops. Since Willie Park won the first championship at
Prestwick in the year 1860 there has, I believe, been no instance of an
Open Champion spending a day in prison. Whereas the bad golfers--and by
bad I do not mean incompetent, but black-souled--the men who fail to
count a stroke when they miss the globe; the men who never replace a
divot; the men who talk while their opponent is driving; and the men
who let their angry passions rise--these are in and out of Wormwood
Scrubbs all the time. They find it hardly worth while to get their hair
cut in their brief intervals of liberty.'
