the picadores stationed themselves at
equal distances from each other round the circumference of the arena.
Then, at a signal from the alcalde, two trumpeters in scarlet, behind
him, stood up and sounded--a man, standing with his hand ready on a
bolt in a door underneath, drew it, and pulled the door swiftly back,
shutting himself into a niche, as the dark space thus opened was
filled by the formidable figure of a bull, who, with glancing horns
and tail erect, bounded out, and, looking around during one fierce
brief pause, made straight at the first picador. The cavalier,
standing straight in his stirrups, his lance tucked firmly under his
arm, fixed the point fairly in the shoulder of the brute, who, never
pausing for that, straightway upset man and horse. Then my grandfather
might be seen stretching far over the front of his box, his eyes
staring on the prostrate picador, and his hands clenched above his
head, while he shouted, "By the Lord, sir, he'll be killed!" And when
a chulo, darting alongside, waved his cloak before the bull's eyes and
lured him away, the Major, drawing a long breath, turned to a calm
Spaniard beside him, and said, "By heaven, sir, 'twas the mercy of
Providence!"--but the Spaniard, taking his cigar from his mouth, and
expelling the smoke through his nostrils, merely said, "Bien esta"
('tis very well.) Meanwhile, the bull (who, like his predecessor in
the china-shop, seemed to have it all his own way) had run his horn
into the heart of a second horse, and the picador, perceiving from the
shivering of the wounded creature that the hurt was mortal, dismounted
in all haste, while the horse, giving one long, blundering stagger,
fell over and died, and was immediately stript of his accoutrements.
This my grandfather didn't like at all; but, seeing no kindred disgust
in the faces round him, he nerved himself, considering that it was a
soldier's business to look on wounds and death. He even beheld, with
tolerable firmness, the spectacle of a horse dashing blindfold and
riderless, and mad with fear and pain, against the barrier--rebounding
whence to the earth with a broken shoulder, it was forced again on its
three legs, and led stumbling from the ring. But when he saw another
horse raised to its feet, and, all ript open as it was, spurred to a
second assault, the Major, who hadn't the heart himself to hurt a fly,
could stand it no longer, but, feeling unwell, retired precipitately
from the scene. On re