The president of the corrida is usually the alcalde or mayor of the town—sometimes the civil governor of the province, always some person of weight and authority, though the alcalde is responsible for the orderly conduct of the corrida, even should he delegate the presidential chair to some one of higher authority. He is required to examine the bulls before the fight: that is, to see that they bear the brand of the herd advertised, and have no visible defect; then he must inspect the horses; even the banderillas and the garrochas, the points of which latter must be shortened as autumn approaches. Till the alcalde appears in his tribune, the fight may not commence, and during the spectacle he orders the incoming of each bull, the time which the picadors shall occupy with their lances: he directs the trumpets of his attendant heralds to sound the changes in the fight, when banderilleros succeed picadors, and for the final scene, when the matador steps alone upon the arena, with scarlet cloak and gleaming sword.
It will thus be seen that the presidential function involves a fairly deep knowledge of all the arts and etiquette of tauromachian science. Under intelligent direction, accidents in the ring and tumults amongst dissatisfied multitudes are avoided—without it, the reverse.
We have now traced in brief outline the life-history of our gallant bull; we have brought him face to face with Frascuelo and his Toledan blade; there we must leave him. But, in concluding this chapter, may we beg the generous reader, should he ever enter the historic circle of the plaza, to go there with an open mind—without prejudice, and unbiassed by the floods of invective which have ever been let loose upon the Spanish bull-fight.
Let critics remember, if only in extenuation, what the spectacle represents to Spain—a national festival, the love of which we have shown to be ineradicable, ingrained in Spanish nature by centuries of custom and tradition. Let them reflect, too, that those brutal domestic scenes which disgrace so many a home among the poor of other lands are, in the land of the bull-fighter, unknown. Lastly, let them remember that upon untrained eyes there must fall flat many of the finer passes, much of the elaborate technique and science of tauromachian art: points which are instantly seized and appreciated by Spanish experts—and in Spain all are experts. This is lost to the casual spectator, who perceives less difficulty in the perilous vol-á-pié than in the simpler, though more attractive, suerte de recibir, and a thousand other technical details.
CHAPTER VI.
THE BÆTICAN WILDERNESS.
SPRING-NOTES OF BIRD-LIFE, NATURAL HISTORY, AND EXPLORATION IN THE MARISMA.
Part I.—April.
Andalucia may roughly be subdivided into four main regions, unequal in extent, but of well-marked physical characters and conformation. These are the sierras, and the rolling corn-lands, at both of which we have already glanced. Then there are the dehesas—wild, uncultivated wastes or prairies, of which more anon. Lastly, there are the marismas.
We have in English no equivalent to the Spanish "marisma," and these regions are so peculiar, both physically and ornithologically, as to require a short description. Geologically, the marismas are the deltas of great rivers, the alluvial accumulations of ages, deposited, layer upon layer, on the sea-bottom till the myriad particles thrust back the sea, and form level plains of dry land. The struggle between rival elements does not terminate, but the attacks of the liquid combatant only seem to result in still further assuring the victory of terra firma, by banking up between the opposing forces an impregnable rampart of sand. The latter, overlying the margin of the rich alluvial mud, is thus capable, in its hollows and deeper dells, of sustaining a luxuriant plant-life, which in turn serves to fortify and consolidate its otherwise unstable consistency.[18]