On the following morning the landlady came in great haste to ask me, “Well, how did it strike you? Did it amuse you? Are you going again? What do you say?”
“I do not know,” I replied; “it seems like a dream. I will tell you later; I must think it over.”
Saturday came, the day before the second bull-fight. “Are you going?” asked the landlady. “No,” I replied, thinking of something else. I went out, turned into the street Alcalá, and found myself accidentally in front of the shop where tickets are sold; there was a crowd of people. “Shall I go?” I asked myself. “Yes or no?”
“Do you want a ticket?” a boy demanded: “a shady seat, No. 6, near the barrier—fifteen reales?” “Done!” I replied.
But to clearly comprehend the nature of this spectacle it is necessary to know its history. No one knows certainly when the first bull-fight took place: the tradition tells that the Cid Campeador was the first cavalier to descend with his spear into the arena and on horseback kill the terrible animal. Later, the young nobles devoted themselves with great ardor to this sport; bull-fights were held at all the solemn feasts, and only to the nobility was granted the honor of taking part in them; even the kings entered the arena. All through the Middle Ages this was the favorite spectacle of the court—the chosen exercise of warriors, not only among the Spaniards, but among the Moors as well; and they both waged war in the circus as well as on the battlefield. Isabella the Catholic wished to prohibit the bull-fights, because she had been horrified on once seeing them, but the numerous and powerful patrons of the spectacle dissuaded her from putting her purpose into effect. After Isabella the circus received great encouragement. Charles V. with his own hand killed a bull in the great square of Valladolid; Ferdinand Pizarro, the celebrated conqueror of Peru, was a valiant torero; King Sebastian of Portugal won many laurels in the arena; Philip III. adorned the circus of Madrid; Philip IV. fought in it; Charles II. fostered the art; in the reign of Philip V. a number of circuses were built by order of the government, but the honor of fighting belonged exclusively to the nobility; they fought only on horseback, splendidly mounted, and yet the only blood shed was that of the bull.
It was not until the middle of the last century that the art became popular, and toreros, properly called artists of the profession, who fought on foot and on horseback, came into existence. The famous Francisco Romero Deronda perfected the art of fighting on foot, introduced the custom of killing the bull face to face with the sword and muleta, and established the practice. Thereupon the spectacle became national and the people welcomed it with enthusiasm. Charles III. forbade it, but his prohibition only served to increase the popular enthusiasm into a complete epidemic, as a Spanish chronicler puts it. King Ferdinand VII., who was passionately fond of bulls, instituted a school of bull-fighting at Seville. Isabella II. was more enthusiastic than Ferdinand VII.; Amadeus I., it is said, was not a whit behind Isabella II. And now bull-fighting flourishes more than ever before in Spain; there are more than a hundred great proprietors who raise bulls for the spectacles; Madrid, Seville, Barcelona, Cadiz, Valencia, Jerez, and Puerto de Santa Maria have circuses of the first order; there are no less than fifty small circuses, with a capacity of from three to nine thousand spectators; in all the villages where there is no circus they hold the corridas in the square. At Madrid they are held every Sunday, and in the other cities whenever it is possible, and they are always attended by a vast concourse of people from the neighboring cities, villages, countryside, mountains, islands, and even from foreign countries.
If is true that all the Spaniards are not mad over this spectacle; many never attend; not a few disapprove, condemn, and would be glad to see it driven out of Spain; some journalists now and then raise a cry of protest; a deputy the day after a torero is killed talks of petitioning the government; but its enemies are all timid and feeble.
On the other hand, apologies are written in defence of the bull-fights, new circuses are built, old ones are renewed, and the foreigners who cry out against Spanish barbarity are laughed to scorn.
The corridas held in the summer are not the only ones, nor is the spectacle always equally good. In the circus there is an exhibition every Sunday through the winter, but there are not those noble and fiery bulls of the summer season, neither are there the great artists whom Spain admires; there are bulls of smaller size and less courage, and toreros not yet proficient in the art; but there is a spectacle, at all events, and, although the king does not attend or the flower of the citizens as in the summer-time, the circus is always well filled. Little blood is shed, only two bulls are killed, and the spectacle concludes with fireworks; it is an amusement fit for servants and children, as the passionate lovers of the art say in deprecation.
But there is one episode in the winter spectacles which is especially amusing. When the toreros have killed the toros de muerte, the arena is placed at the disposal of the dilettanti; from every part the people jump down, and in a moment there are a hundred workmen, scholars, and street arabs, some with cloaks in their hands, others with shawls, others with any sort of a rag, who crowd to right and left of the toril ready to receive the bull. The door opens; a bull with swathed horns rushes into the arena, and there follows an indescribable tumult; the crowd surrounds, follows, and drags the bull here and there, hitting him with their mantles and shawls, plaguing and tormenting him in a thousand ways, until the poor animal, entirely exhausted, is driven from the arena and another takes his place. It is incredible with what audacity those boys dart under him, twist his tail, and jump on his back; incredible too is the agility with which they dodge the blows. Sometimes the bull with a sudden turn strikes some one, knocks him down, tosses him in the air, or lifts him high on his horns; again he upsets at one blow a half dozen, and bull and men disappear in a cloud of dust, while the spectator fears for an instant that some one has been killed. Nothing of the kind! The intrepid capeadores jump up with bruised limbs and dusty faces, shrug their shoulders, and face him again. But this is by no means the best episode of the winter spectacles. Sometimes the bulls are confronted by toreras instead of toreros: these are women dressed like tightrope-walkers, with faces before which not the angels, but even Lucifer, would