Four Months Afoot in Spain

by Harry Alverson Franck

A wild snort, and there plunged into the arena as powerful and savage a brute as it had ever yet been my lot to see. For an instant he stood motionless, blinking in the blinding sunlight. Then suddenly catching sight of the statue flaming with the hated color, he shot away toward it with the speed of an express-train--a Spanish express at least--until, a bare three feet from it, he stopped instantly stone-still by thrusting out his forelegs like a Western broncho, then slowly, gingerly tiptoed up to the motionless figure, sniffed at it, and turned and trotted away.

The public burst forth in a thunderclap of applause. Villar got right end up as calmly and gracefully as a French count in a drawing-room, laid a hand on his heart, and smiling serenely, bowed once, twice, th---- and just then a startled roar went up from the tribunes, for the bull had suddenly turned and, espying the man in red, dashed at him with lowered horns and a bellow of anger.

There is nowhere registered, so far as my investigations carry, the record of José Villar, son of Villarillo, in the hundred-yard dash. But this much may be asserted with all assurance, that it has in it nothing of that slow, languid, snail-like pace of the ten-second college champion. Which was well; for some two inches below his flying heels, as he set a new record likewise in the vaulting of barriers, the murderous horns crashed into the oak plank tablas with the sound of a freight collision and an earnestness that gave work to the plaza carpenters for some twenty minutes to come.

Therein Villar was more fortunate than the Mexican Tancredo, inventor of the "suerte," and for whom it was named. Tancredo, like Dr. Guillotin, was overreached by his own invention, for while his record for the hundred was but a second or two less than that of Villar, it was just this paltry margin that made him, on the day next following his last professional appearance, the chief though passive actor in a spectacle of quite a different character.

The "Suerte de Tancredo" has never won any vast amount of popularity in Spain, except with the spectators. Toreros in general manifest a hesitation akin to bashfulness in thus seeking the plaudits of the multitude. By reason of which diffidence among his fellows, José, son of Villarillo, memorable matador de toros, pockets after each such recreation a sum that might not seem overwhelming to an American captain of industry or to a world-famous tenor, but one which the average Spaniard cannot name in a single breath.

Salamanca's day of amusement did not, however, by any means end here. Beneath the name of "Thunder," the professional matador, there was printed with equal bombast that of FERNANDO MARTÍN. Now Fernando was quite evidently a salmantino butt, a tall gawky fellow whose place in the society of Salamanca was apparently very similar to that of those would-be or has-been baseball players to be found vegetating in many of our smaller towns. Like them, too, Fernando was in all probability wont to hover about the pool-rooms and dispensing-parlors of his native city, boasting of his untested prowess at the national game. That his talents might not, therefore, forever remain hidden under a wineglass, and also, perhaps, because his services might be engaged at five hundred pesetas less than the five hundred that a professional sobresaliente would have demanded, the thoughtful city fathers had caused him to be set down on the program, likewise in striking type, as "SUBSTITUTE WITH NECESSITY (CON NECESIDAD) TO KILL THE FOURTH BULL."

It was this "necesidad" that worked the undoing of Fernando Martín. When the customary by-play had been practised on the fourth animal, enter Fernando with bright red muleta, false pigtail, glinting sword, and anything but the sure-of-one's-self countenance of a professional espada. He faced the brute first directly in front of the block of guardias civiles, and the nearest he came to laying the animal low at the first thrust was to impale on a horn and sadly mutilate a sleeve of his own gay and rented jacket. The crowd jeered, as crowds will the world over at the sight of a man whose father and mother and even grandfather they have known for years trying to prove himself the equal of men imported from elsewhere. Fernando advanced again, maneuvering for position, though with a peculiar movement of the knees not usual among toreros, and which was all too visible to every eye in the hooting multitude. Trueno, the professional, stuck close at his side in spite of the clamorous demand of the public that he leave the salmantino to play out his own game unhampered. Martín hazarded two or three more nerveless thrusts, with no other damage, thanks to the watchful eye and cloak of Trueno, than one toss of ten feet and a bleeding groin. By this time the jeering of his fellow-townsmen had so overshadowed the tyro's modicum of good sense that he turned savagely on his protector and ordered him to leave the ring. Fortunately Trueno was not of the stuff to take umbrage at the insults of a foolish man in a rage, or the population of Salamanca would incontestably have been reduced by one before that merry day was done.

The utmost length of time between the entrance of a professional matador for the last act and the death of the bull is four or five minutes. Fernando Martín trembled and toiled away ten, twenty, thirty, forty. Slowly, but certainly and visibly his bit of courage oozed away; the peculiar movement of his knees grew more and more pronounced. No longer daring to meet the bull face to face, he skulked along the barrier until the animal's tail was turned and, dashing past him at full speed, stabbed backward at his neck as he ran, to the uproarious merriment of the spectators. Trueno saved his life certainly a score of times. At last, when the farce had run close upon fifty minutes, a signal from the alcalde sent across the arena the sharp note of a bugle, two cabestros, or trained steers were turned into the ring, and the bull, losing at once all belligerency, trotted docilely away with them. The star of Fernando Martín, would-be matador de toros, was forever set, and if he be not all immune to ridicule his native city surely knows him no more.

It is law that no bull that has once entered the ring shall live. Curious to know what was to be the fate of this animal, I sprang over the barrier and hurried across to the gate by which he had disappeared. There I beheld a scene that forever dispelled any notion that the task of the matador is an easy one, however simple it may look from the tribunes. The bull was threshing to and fro within a small corral, bellowing with rage and lashing the air with his tail. It required six men and a half-hour of time to lasso and drag him to the fence. With a hundred straining at the rope his head was drawn down under the gate, a man struck him several blows with a sledge, and another, watching his opportunity, swung his great navaja and laid wide open the animal's throat.

It was late when, having mingled for some time with the country folk dancing on the sandy plain before the plaza, I returned to the city for my bundle and repaired to the station. A twelve-hour ride was before me. For I had decided to explore a territory where even the scent of tourists is unknown,--the northwest province of Galicia.