The climate we cannot control, but I often wonder why there should be such a dearth of true grass courts at open meetings.  Of course maintenance involves a certain amount of expense, but surely many clubs are quite well enough off to command at least one or two really good courts.  Can it be ignorance, or is it a want of necessary energy and constant attention?  Lawn tennis seems to suffer in this respect more than most games.  There are hundreds of splendid golf greens and cricket pitches all over the country, but for some inexplicable reason a good grass lawn tennis court is, as Mr. G.W.  Hillyard has remarked, “almost as rare a sight as a dead donkey.”  Happily we get this rare spectacle at Wimbledon under Mr. Hillyard’s able care and management.

[Illustration:  GROUP OF PLAYERS AT THE NEWCASTLE TOURNAMENT, 1902]

What a difference a general improvement in surface would mean!  I am convinced that if courts were better the standard of play would advance more rapidly.  It is marvellous what beneficial effect a good court has on play.  I have seen an average player, who had always played on bad courts, with cramped surroundings and poor background, put up a really good game the very first time he played on a first-class court—­I refer to a well-known private court at Thorpe Satchville, perhaps the best in the country.  That player surprised himself and every one else present.  He performed about half-thirty better than his usual game.  The moral is that if other players had the opportunity of playing regularly on a true and fast court they must essentially improve.  On bad courts you can never be sure what the ball will do; it is a toss-up whether you get a false bound or not.  A player once told me that he thought it a good thing to have these bad courts at your house or club to practise upon.  When you went to tournaments, he argued, you would not mind what you found there, as the conditions could not be worse, and might be better, and you would always be in the happy frame of mind of not expecting too much and never being disappointed.  Your game would not be put off by depressing conditions—­you were so used to them!  But that is poor logic.  After all, we play the game for pleasure, and there can be no enjoyment in playing on wretched courts.  Many unfortunate players, if they wish to play the game at all, are forced to play on what Mr. Mahony used to call “cabbage patches”—­("Sorry, partner, it hopped on a cabbage,” was his favourite expression after missing a ball in a double); but I cannot understand any one voluntarily choosing such a surface.

A wood floor has such an absolutely true bound that it must provide very good practice, and one winter’s play on the indoor courts at Queen’s Club is to my mind a quicker way of improving your game than two or three seasons on grass courts which are not of the best.  These covered wood courts are very scarce, and it is a thousand pities there are so few of them.  Would that this winter game were in the reach of everybody!  On the other hand, you can overdo the game by playing continuously; and if you have been playing all through the summer with scarcely a break, it is a good plan to rest during the winter months, taking up some other game to keep your eye in and your condition fit.