Such Is
The Force Of A High Resolve In Strangers Bent Upon A Lesson Of
Civilization To A Barbarous People When Disappointed Of Their Purpose.
But We Learned Too Late That Only In Madrid Is There Any Bull-Feasting
In The Winter.
In the provincial cities the bulls are dispirited by the
cold; but in the capital, for the honor of the nation, they somehow pull
themselves together and do their poor best to kill and be killed.
Yet in
the capital where the zeal of the bulls, and I suppose, of the
bull-fighters, is such, it is said that there is a subtle decay in the
fashionable, if not popular, esteem of the only sport which remembers in
the modern world the gladiatorial shows of imperial Rome. It is said,
but I do not know whether it is true, that the young English queen who
has gladly renounced her nation and religion for the people who seem so
to love her, cannot endure the bloody sights of the bull-feast; and when
it comes to the horses dragging their entrails across the ring, or the
_espada_ despatching the bull, or the bull tossing a _landerillero_ in
the air she puts up her fan. It is said also that the young Spanish
king, who has shown himself such a merciful-minded youth, and seems so
eager to make the best of the bad business of being a king at all,
sympathizes with her, and shows an obviously abated interest at these
supreme moments.
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