Page:Out-door Games Cricket and Golf (1901).djvu/236

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AMATEURS AND PROFESSIONALS
197

carry on quite a different system: they accept money under the disguise of expenses, they are called under-secretaries of the clubs, while they play every match; and finally, a benefit match is not played in their behalf, but a complimentary match is, and I have never yet heard a definition given of these two terms which would establish a difference between them. You may blink at the fact in whatever way you like, but when once any sort of payment is given, whether under the head of expenses or whatever else you like, you then and there make it impossible to have clear and sound principles whereby you may call every man one of two things—an amateur or professional.

I can only explain the very large number of amateurs by the fact that the wealth of the country is being distributed over wider areas. It would not appear to be quite germane to a talk on golf, but it is, I believe, true that the increase in the number of limited liability companies is one cause of the increase of the ranks of the amateurs who can practically devote all their time to golf. Where manufactories, ironworks, and coal-pits were all worked by an individual, or