The Wichita daily eagle. [volume] (Wichita, Kan.) 1890-1906, 1900-02-21

| yelled the price It was a slaughter sale.
I bought three arm loads Of peoples for
fifty cents, and the seller thought he had
cheated me. Back TO the hotel for a
moments rest and then we rejoin our
| host and llostes on the Alameda, where
a funny Sunday custom was being OBJ
served The Alameda is park about
| five blocks square. Over diagonal walk
| in the Alameda there is stretched every
| Sunday canopy its full length. The
walk is carpeted. For two hours, from
! II O'Clock a. m, to 1 o'clock p. m, society
| is supposed to walk up and down here
| in its Sunday clothes. We tried 1t our
| selves, and It was plain TO be seen that
the affair had come to be too common and
the real aristocrats, the castillians of this
land, no longer walk and that those who
aspire do. I saw here the Spanish
greeting often. Two men meet and hug
| each other tight, clapping each other on
the back vigorously. Women in greeting
| kiss each other on either cheek, not on
the lips. In parting woman viii shut
her fingers together, kiss the index
finger, and instantly spread her fingers
apart in the direction of her friend. She
throws five kisses this way. I didn't
particularly like this Sunday promenade,
and I hope the Mexican government will
abolish it.
From the promenade we went to. Mr.
Hudson's home for dinner, where upon
our request, certain Mexican dishes were
served, with puIque and then to the bull
fight
The bull-fght as a sport is greatly mis-
understood. Just in front of me sat a
young man, said to be the richest in
Mexico, who took the trouble to explain
points to me. 1 began to see that bull
fighting like base ball has its technique.
To man who doesn't understand base
ball triple play between right field and
first, first and third, third and second
would appear very, very tame. The en-
thusiasm Of the bleachers over such
play is because of its technical perfec-
ton. The same thing occurs repeatedly
in bull-fghting. A bull, by a certain
spread of his front legs, may indicate
an idiossyncrasy of attack, and the way
the bull-fghters get away from him Is
a caution To the uninformed spectator,
the bull appears to have no show, but
it is fact that repeatedly there are
situations in which a single false step
would mean the death of a man. The
old attendants understand every point
and go wild over a good play and crazy
over a bad one. The first inquiry in your
mind when you enter the big circus, Is
what the soldiers are for. There must
be five hundred. They are scattered all
through the audience, with fixed bayo-
nets. The reason for this is that the
price of admission is high zone dollar the
lowesD, and when the bu,l-ight is poor
the crowd Is liable to jump in, tear up the
seats and wreck the building in angry
protest. This IS a brief description Of
a bull-fght. A man in a box with the
umpire, blows a horn and a bull who
has been kept in darkness for hours.
rushes out into the arena, from a gate
marked with the name of the province
Of his birth. About six men come out
into the ring and f1aunt red garments
at the bull. He chases them. Four men
join those already in the ring These
four are armed with colored sticks with
Darbs on the ends. Each has different
colo-ed barbed sticks. Pink makes a
the man meets him and sticks the pink
sticks in the bulls shoulders. If the
sticks are well placed the crowd cheers;
il poorly, it roars. Red tries his hand:
green tries his. By this time the bull is
bleeding a little from the shoulders He
is charging all the time, when not paw
ing. He charges with eyes shut. A cow
does not close her eyes when charging
and bull-ighters would refuse to enter
a ring with an irritated cow The horn
blows again Two men on horses come
out The horses are very poor One of
their eyes is bandaged. The man carries
a pole with a steel point. The bull is in
furiated at the sight Of a horse, but at
first does not see these. Two boys in red
follow the horses and whip them 10 make
them go. The horse is whipped up to
the bull on the horses blind side The
bull sees the horse and charges him. The
man sticks the pole into the bull to keep
him off. If he SUCCEEDS. he turns and
bows to the audience and expects to be
flooded with silver. He gets about a
dime. Finally the bull cores a horse. A
man rushes up to the horse and stahs
a little dagger into the horses brain.
Then the men of the spears retire. The
horn blows again and the matador, the
boss OF the whole business, comes out
He carries a red garment and a small
sword and is brilliantly dressed in gold
and red and wears his long hair in sort
of a bulk behind. He plays with the
bull a long time the idea being to tire
the bull into lowering his head, so that
the sword can be used. At last the ma
tador steadies his blade, aiming it d.
rectly over the BULBS horns, the bull
to the hilt The bull falls instantly in
most cases and a man drives a dagger
into his brain and the bull is quiet At
TIE matadors stroke the band starts up
brisk tune and from one part Of the
hats are thrown into the
arena The rnatador bows. picks them I'd
one by ore and whilrs them back. The
killing Of the horses IS atr0cious. ami
fills all Americans with indignation. As
a rule no American attends a bull-fght
twice. About seven bulls are killed o. an
afternoon. The matador 1 saw gets
$4,000 a year.
After supp r we went 10 charity Ba-
zaar, an invitation affair in the big In
ner court of the College of Mines, an
affair which President and Mrs. Daz at
tended. Tt. women were mostly dressed
IN Paris gowns. I picked out some and
asked about their wealth. and knew as
little after as before. The affair. with
the difference Of language. was similar