A HISTORY OF KENT Tonbridge Golf Club, instituted in October 1893, has a sporting course of 9 holes situated between Tonbridge and Hildenborough. The dub prizes include the Bent Cup, the Floyd Bowl, the Furley Cleek and the Lucas Iron. The President's Prize is played for in November. The Chislehurst Golf Club, founded in 1894, has a somewhat short course in the park of Camden Place, where a record of 64 for the 18 holes has been established by Mr. O. C. Bevan and Mr. C. E. Dick. ' The beautiful and historic house of Camden Place is the club-house. At Culverden and at Tunbridge Wells two courses were opened in 1896, that at Culver- den being of 9 holes on high ground 500 feet above the town, while the links of the Tun- bridge Wells club, also of 9 holes, are on quick-drying pasture with s.nndy subsoil close to the common. The ladies of the Tunbridge Wells club have a club-house of their own. At Bearsted is the l8-hole course of the Maidstone Golf Club, instituted in 1897. Tickle's record of 73 and Mr. F. G. Stenning's of 75 for this undulating course testify to its sporting character. The Maidstone Ladies' Club, founded a year later, is a branch of the men's club. The Dartford Golf Club, instituted in 1897, has a 9-hole course at Dartford Heath which has been greatly extended of late years. It is on old pasture-land with gravel subsoil, and has natural and artificial hazards of various kinds. The length is if miles with a par score of 39. The ground is never muddy, indeed it is apt to bake in hot and dry weather. The Sundridge Park Golf Club has a fine inland course on Sir Samuel Scott's estate close to Bromley, which was opened in 1901. It is a long i8-hole course laid out with excellent judgement over ground of very undulating character. The holes are of good length, and if there is a certain sameness about some of them the fine large greens, most of which are natural, the beautiful lies and the variety of the hazards more than atone for this. Yet another of the many golf links in the neighbourhood of London is that of the Barnehurst Club. This is a somewhat short i8-hole course laid out by James Braid in 1903, in vhich year 9-hole courses at Ashford and Gravesend were opened. The Graves- end links are on the marshes between Graves- end and Higham, and are shortly to be lengthened to 18 holes. The Eltham Warren Golf Club greatly enlarged its sporting links of 9 holes in 1904, and as the soil is dry and sandy the course is improving rapidly. Youngest of Kent golf courses is the excel- lent one belonging to the Wrotham Heath Club, founded in 1906. The links are on Highlands Farm, Wrotham Heath, nearly 400 feet above the sea-level, and though there are only 9 holes, they are planned with such skill and are of such good length, the natural hazards are so interesting, and the turf, being on undulating ground throughout the course, is of such fine quality, that the club may be congratulated on its really fine course, which has every promise of becoming the very best of the inland courses in the county. The Editor desires to express his cordial thanks to the secretaries of many clubs who have kindly supplied much of the information that is incorporated in these notes on golf in Kent. ATHLETICS The historian who sets himself the task of recording the story of Kent athletics finds at once that he has to deal with a county possessing peculiarities of its own with regard to this branch of sport ; indeed, in one particular respect, Kent stands almost, if not quite, in a class by itself. Other counties have their amateur and their pro- fessional side of athletics, but in Kent the latter feature predominates to a much greater extent than can be found, probably, in any other part of the kingdom. Athletic sports, promoted under the laws and regulations of the Amateur Athletic Association, are com- paratively few and far between, Avhereas meetings of the unregistered type are numer- ous in almost every part of the county. The athlete who indulges in sport for sport's sake, which, as all must admit, is the healthiest form of recreation for mind and body that can be devised, would expect to find that in this part of England as else- where amateur gatherings held under the auspices'of the A.A.A. were on the increase; but such unfortunately is not the case. It is to be noticed, indeed, that a num- ber of meetings which were once of the unregistered type, and whose promoters tried the experiment of holding their sports under the aegis of the * Three A's,' found 516
