ria was an auction for horses and cattle, and
today it is still a time when the best horsemen show off their fine
horses and their skill at riding. During the feria, the proud horsemen
wear leather aprons something like our cowboys' chaps over their tight
gray riding pants. Their bolero jackets are black trimmed with braid,
and their hats are black too, the flat, wide-brimmed felt hats which
horsemen always wear in Spain.

Horses are curried until they shine, and flowers and ribbons are twined
in their manes and tails and decorate their bridles. Beautiful
black-haired girls dress up like gypsies, something they would not be
allowed to do at any other time. As the girls ride in the saddles behind
their young men, the long, flounced, polka-dotted skirts of red, green
or blue fall down over the horse's side. Black lace mantillas are draped
over very tall combs in their hair, and a gay flower is usually pinned
behind one ear. Every carriage, every farm cart, every house and every
person is decorated with flowers.

At harvest time, when olives, grapes, fruit or grain are brought in from
the land, there is much merry-making, too. At Jerez de la Frontera, a
sunny town in Andalusia where everybody works at growing grapes and
making them into a famous wine called sherry, the harvest festival comes
just before the grapes are ready to be harvested, in September.

[Illustration]

High-wheeled vineyard carts decorated with vines and flowers are pulled,
by sturdy oxen, out of every vineyard in the countryside, carrying all
the pretty girls who work there and a basket of new grapes. The carts
wind through the streets to the Cathedral, where the grapes are blessed
and all the people pray and give thanks for a good harvest. Then, in the
square in front of the Cathedral, a great flock of pigeons is loosed
into the air. These are homing pigeons, and they fly back to their homes
in every part of Spain, carrying the message that the harvest is about
to begin. There's dancing in the streets all night, and the next day
there are bullfights, races and more dancing. Then the people all go to
work to harvest the grapes.

[Illustration]

On Spanish holidays, there is plenty to eat and drink. For visitors,
eating is fun even on any ordinary day. If you were to travel from
region to region in Spain, you would notice that people eat different
foods in different places. Along the seacoasts, of course, they eat many
kinds of fish. In the north,