The Next Day The Festivities, Which Were To Indemnify The People For The
Austerities Of Lent And Of Passion Week, Began.
The cock-pits were opened
during the day, and masked balls were given in the evening at the
theatres.
You know, probably, that cock-fighting is the principal
diversion of the island, having entirely supplanted the national spectacle
of bull-baiting. Cuba, in fact, seemed to me a great poultry-yard. I heard
the crowing of cocks in all quarters, for the game-cock is the noisiest
and most boastful of birds, and is perpetually uttering his notes of
defiance. In the villages I saw the veterans of the pit, a strong-legged
race, with their combs cropped smooth to the head, the feathers plucked
from every part of the body except their wings, and the tail docked like
that of a coach horse, picking up their food in the lanes among the
chickens. One old cripple I remember to have seen in the little town of
Guines, stiff with wounds received in combat, who had probably got a
furlough for life, and who, while limping among his female companions,
maintained a sort of strut in his gait, and now and then stopped to crow
defiance to the world. The peasants breed game-cocks and bring them to
market; amateurs in the town train them for their private amusement.
Dealers in game-cocks are as common as horse-jockies with us, and every
village has its cock-pit.
I went on Monday to the _Valla de Gallos_, situated in that part of Havana
which lies without the walls.
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