uddenly a bugle-call sounds from the judges'
platform, and the _picadores_, men on horseback, with their legs
protected by armour and bearing sharp-pointed lances in their hands,
enter and ride around the arena, bowing to the judges and assembled
multitude, who receive them with plaudits. Again a bugle-call, and the
sliding doors leading from the _corral_ are opened, and a bull,
bounding forward therefrom, stops short a moment and eyes the assembled
multitude and the men on horseback with wrathful yet inquiring eye. A
moment only. Sniffing the air and lashing his tail, the noble bovine
rushes forward and engages the _picadores_; the little pennants of the
national colours, which, attached to a barbed point, have been jabbed
into his back by an unseen hand as he passed the barrier, fluttering in
the wind created by his rush. Furiously he charges the _picadores_. If
they are clever they goad him to madness with their lances, keeping him
at bay; if he is resolute down go horse and man--both results tickling
the popular fancy immensely--and those frightful horns are buried deep
in the bowels of the unfortunate steed, which, maddened with agony and
fright, leaps up and tears around the arena, trampling perhaps upon his
own entrails which have gushed forth from the gaping wound! At times
the wound is hastily sewn up, and the unfortunate horse, with a man
behind him with a heavy whip, another tugging at the bridle, and the
_picador_ on his back with his enormous spurs, forces the trembling
brute to face the savage bull again, whilst the audience once more
roars out its applause. As many as ten horses are killed or ruined at
times by a single bull, who returns again and again to plunge his horns
into the prostrate carcase ere it is dragged away. This is sport!

[Illustration: BULL-FIGHT IN THE CITY OF MEXICO, SHOWING THE SPECTATORS
OF THE "SOL," THE PICADORES, AND THE ENTERING BULL.]

But perhaps the bull himself is faint-hearted! Then, indeed, the noble
Spanish blood of the audience is aroused to fever pitch. "_Otro toro!
Otro toro_"--"Another bull! bring another bull!"--rises from a thousand
throats. Otherwise the other acts of the performance take their course,
and the _banderilleros_, bull-fighters armed with short gaudily
decorated spears with barbed points, come on. Some "pretty" play now
ensues, the _banderilleros_ constantly facing the bull at arm's length
with the object of gracefully sticking the spears or _banderilla