from mischievous or
languishing eyes--and at the end always a bull-fight.

Here we touch the very soul of Spain. Take away the bull-rings, make an
end of the _toreros_, and Spain is no longer Spain--perhaps a country
counting more highly in the evolution of humanity as a whole, but it
will need another name if that day ever comes, of which there does not
now seem to be the remotest possibility. All that can be said is that
to-day there is a party, or there are individuals, in the country who
profess to abhor the bull-fight, and wish to see it ended; it is
doubtful if up to this time any Spaniard ever entertained such an
"outlandish" notion. The bull-fight is said to have been founded by the
Moors of Spain, although bulls were probably fought with or killed in
Roman amphitheatres. The principle on which they were founded was the
display of horsemanship, use of the lance, courage, coolness, and
dexterity--all accomplishments of the Arabs of the desert. It is
undoubtedly the latter qualities which make the sport so fascinating to
English _aficionados_, of whom there are many, and have caused the
_fiestas de toros_ to live on in the affections of the whole Spanish
people. In its earliest days, gentlemen, armed only with the _rejon_,
the short spear of the original Iberian, about four feet long, fought in
the arena with the bulls, and it was always a fair trial of skill and a
display of good horsemanship.

When the fatal race of the French Bourbons came to the throne, and the
country was inundated with foreign favourites, the Court and the French
hangers-on of the kings turned the fashion away from the national sport,
and it gradually fell into the hands of the lower classes, professional
bull-fighters taking the place of the courtly players of old, and these
were drawn from the lowest and worst ranks of the masses; the sporting
element, to a great extent, died out, and the whole spectacle became
brutalised. _Pan y toros_ (bread and bulls) were all the people wanted,
and, crushed out of all manliness by their rulers, and taught a thirst
for cruelty and bloodshed by the example of their religious
_autos-da-fe_, the bull-fight became the revolting spectacle which
foreigners--especially the English--have been so ready to rail against
as a disgrace to the Spanish nation, while they rarely let an
opportunity escape them of assisting as interested spectators at what
they condemned so loudly, and they quite forgot their own prize