Good act! The crowd goes wild again. This sport is kept up for half an hour, till the poor beast's sides are full of barbed spears, and the crowd cries out for blood, more blood, when the lord high executioner steps up with a long, murderous, stiff-bladed sword, about four feet long, and with his blanket tempts the tired bull to lower his head, then he drives the sword to its hilt between the bull's shoulders.
The bull does not drop dead. The matador missed his heart; but with that blade thrust through his body, the bull staggers—braces himself on his four feet. The matador vainly tempts the bull to charge the blanket. The look in the dying bull's eyes would move a heart of stone to pity—he trembles, falls to his knees, drops in a convulsive heap, and dies.
The matador salaams low as he receives the plaudits of the crowd. A team of fine horses, decked in red blankets, is driven on a gallop to the dead bull, a rope is attached to his legs, and the horses gallop out of the arena, snaking the bull in their wake.
They tortured three yesterday, but I was more than satisfied with one, when I left them to their sport
The team comes back, and in like theatrical manner the dead horse is snaked off, and the crowd sets up a howl to bring on another bull. Three to five bulls are tortured for an afternoon's "entertainment." They tortured three yesterday, but I was more than satisfied with one, when I left them to their "sport." Carranza's headquarters are at Juarez. He "graced" the bull fight with his presence, and if Huerta had been in Juarez he would probably have been there too.
II
"MISSOURI" AND HIS FALSE TEETH
I labor under a great disadvantage in writing this ship-board letter, en route from San Francisco to Yokohama.
My contract reads that these letters shall tell of personal experiences, and when I discover a new, fresh theme that I am not qualified to tackle, I naturally feel that fate has been unkind to me.