The Story of Seville

by Walter M. Gallichan

The spectators, men, women and children, closely watch every move and double of the fighters. A picador is thrown. The horse, with a ghastly dripping wound in its flank, rushes around the ring. It is met by the bull, gored, and tossed in the air. The wounded nag cannot regain its feet. Again and again the infuriated toro vents its rage on the struggling horse. Presently, the bull's attention is drawn from the steed, and it turns to face the gaudy matador. A thrust of a dagger ends the convulsive kicking of the dying horse.

With scientific precision, the swordsman flutters his muleta in the bull's face. At each charge the matador bounds aside, and the beast worries the red rag. At length, toro stands snorting and pawing the ground. The magnificent brute surveys his enemy with hatred, and makes another rush. Again it is thwarted. Finally, the sword is plunged deftly into the creature's viscera. Toro trembles, falls, and lies prone. The coup de grace is administered with a big knife. There is deafening applause, the strains of the band, and the dead bull is dragged from the ring by a team of mules.

'When I see children at the corrida, I sigh and think of the future of Spain,' said my Spanish friend. Such expression of opinion is almost treasonable. Long live the bull fight! Humanitarian cant is not to be taken seriously. It is not only the Spanish people who love the sport. 'There are no more enthusiastic patrons of the bull ring in Madrid,' writes Mr. H. C. Chatfield Taylor, author of The Land of the Castanet, 'than many of the foreign diplomats, and one remembers clearly the Secretary of the United States Legation, stationed in Madrid at the time of a former visit, saying that he was an annual subscriber, and had not missed a corrida during his entire term of office.'

The Life of the Fighting Bull.

In Great Britain our nobility and gentle-folk breed racehorses. In Spain the aristocracy and grandees rear bulls for the ring. The breeders of bulls are termed ganaderos. Around Seville, Jerez, Huelva and Valladolid are born the toros bravos. At the age of one year the bulls selected for the arena are branded, and sent on to the plains to graze, in charge of a conocedor, who is assisted by an ayudante. When the bulls are two years of age, they are tried for the first time to prove their pluck and pugnacity. At four years old they are put into huge enclosures of good pasturage, and in time of scarcity they are fed upon vetches, maize and wheat. From five to seven toro is warrantable for the lidia. At his trial, at the age of two years, the owner of the herd invites a number of friends to the ranche. Young and clever horsemen attend these trials, and vie with one another in courage. The caballeros are armed with the garrochas, lances about twelve feet in length, with short steel points. Visitors to Seville may often see parties of mounted sportsmen returning from these tentadores, or trials.

A bull is separated from its companions. The horseman, carrying the garrocha, pursues the brute, and attempts to overturn it by a powerful thrust on the flank, delivered at full gallop. The horseman must be a bold rider, possessed of coolness and strong in the arm. If the charge is successful, toro tumbles with its feet in the air. Another rider now takes up the attack. He has a sharper spear, and is called el tentador. Should the young bull refuse to charge, it is discarded as a toro bravo, and the slaughter-house or the life of labour awaits it. The chosen bulls are then christened, and entered upon the breeder's list of warrantable animals. In due time their names appear on the brilliant placards advertising the corridas of Seville or Cadiz.

'The tentadero at the present day,' writes the authors of Wild Spain, 'affords opportunity for aristocratic gatherings, that recall the tauromachian tournaments of old. Even the Infantas of Spain enter into the spirit of the sport, and have been known themselves to wield the garrocha with good effect, as was, a few months ago, the case at a brilliant fête champêtre on the Sevillian vegas, when the Condesa de Paris and her daughter, Princess Elena, each overthrew a sturdy two-year-old; the Infanta Eulalia riding á ancas, or pillion-fashion, with an Andalucian nobleman, among the merriest of a merry party.'

Travelling by rail across the wide and lonely plains of Southern and Central Spain, the stranger often sees large herds of bulls, quietly grazing in charge of an attendant, who leans upon a long wooden staff, and wears a plaid upon his shoulder. The Spanish travellers crowd to the window at the magical words los toros, and in an animated manner the points of the herd are discussed. This pleasant pastoral life lasts for five years of the bull's life, though during that time it has to endure the trial with the garrocha. The bulls are divided into three classes after the tientas, or trials, i.e., those of the first rank, the 'brave bulls'; those of the second order, the novillos, which are used by second-rate matadores and beginners, and those sentenced to death, or a life of toil. Amongst the most eminent strains of Andalusian bulls used for the ring are those of Cámara, Miura, Muruve, Pérez de la Concha, Conradi, Adalid, Ibarra, Saltillo, and Anastasio Martin.

The animals are sold from four to eight at a time, according to the status of the corrida for which they are purchased. If the distance to the ring is short, the bulls are driven by night through the country, and pastured in the daytime. They are led by peaceable cattle with bells hung from their necks. 'These intelligent beasts keep the wild ones together and out of mischief,' says Mr. Leonard Williams, 'with the same unerring watchfulness as a collie controlling a flock of sheep, and lightening to an incalculable extent the labours of the accompanying horsemen.' At night the bulls are driven into the town, the sides of the streets being barricaded. When the beasts are consigned to buyers at a long distance from the ranche, they are conveyed by rail in strong boxes.

Just before the encounter in the ring, the toros are confined in the chiqueros, dark dens with strong doors that are opened and closed by ropes pulled from above. Difficulty is often experienced in coaxing refractory animals into these cells. The operation is witnessed by aficionados, who pay a fee for the privilege.