“How?” I interrupted.

“By the way they go at it.  The one who covers the most ground on a ball field will cover the most ground later on in whatever he undertakes.  The one who plays to win, who takes chances even at the risk of making errors is the coming man.  The boy who sits down in the out-field, on the theory that a ball is not likely to come in his direction, will be poor all his life.  The boy who plays an unimportant position as if his very existence depended upon it will get along all right, and don’t you forget it.  But this golf game is so simple that it does not call on a man to let himself out.  Billiards is my game.  Billiards is a game of endless possibilities, and no matter how well a man plays there is always room for improvement.”

That made me mad, and I resented this assertion the more for the reason that I once held the same views as he then expressed.  I went right at him.

“When you have played as many games of golf as you have of billiards,” I said, and I play a fair billiard game myself, “you will not mention them in the same breath.  Let me assure you, Mr. Harding, that golf is the most difficult game in the world, and you have only the slightest conception of what you must master before you can play more than an indifferent sort of a game.”

He smiled indulgently.

“What is there hard about it?” he demanded.  “In billiards, for instance, you—­”

“You play billiards on a table which is not more than five feet by ten,” I broke in, “and you play golf on a table which may cover two hundred acres of hills, woods, marshes, ponds, brooks, and meadows.  You play billiards in a room which is always at about the same temperature, and where there is not a breath of air stirring.  You play golf out-of-doors, where it may be one hundred in the shade or far below freezing; under conditions of perfect calm, or with winds ranging all the way from a zephyr to gales from every point of the compass.”

“There is something in that,” he admitted, “but you need not get mad about it, Smith.”

“Your billiard table is always the same,” I continued.  “It consists of the cloth and four cushions, and they are smooth as art can make them.  Your golf course is never the same on any two days, and would not be if you played through all eternity.  Sometimes the grass in a certain place is long, and sometimes it is short; sometimes it is thick, and again it is thin; sometimes the ground is hard from lack of rain, and again it is soft and spongy from an excess of rain.  There are millions of variations in these conditions, and every one of them must be considered in making a perfect shot.”

“Yes, I suppose that is so,” he admitted, and I could see I had started him thinking.

“There are days when the air is light,” I went on, “and when a certain stroke will send the ball where you wish it to go.  There are other days when the air is heavy, and when a hit ball seems to have no life in it.  You must allow for the force and direction of every slant of wind.  There are conditions of atmosphere when objects seem near, and others when they seem far away, and you must take this into account.”