grudgingly remarked. To the bull-ring I therefore
hastened at once, and having purchased a
ticket which was to admit me to any part of
the amphitheatre, elbowed my way through the
swarming crowd, and entered. I had no eyes
for the mass of gay-coloured apparel or the rows
of eager excited faces, tier above tier, and still
less for what was going on in the ring, where a
young bull was being goaded to fury by sharp
tridents and fluttering flags, a mere prologue to
the more thrilling scenes that were to follow.
But the crowd baffled me. Such multitudes
from the neighbouring towns and villages,
attracted by the spectacle, had poured into
Malaga, that it was only for the ladies, and a
favoured few of the magistracy and nobles, that
seats could be retained. The rest stood so
thickly massed together that I soon found that
to trace out Mr. Edwards was hopeless. Giving
up the effort in despair, I turned to depart, but
through some mistake, instead of gaining the
open air, I struck into a long passage leading I
knew not whither, though I heard the bellowing
of the bulls from the dens where they were shut
up. Suddenly, from a sort of crypt, the half-open
door of which was on my right, came the
sound of voices, and I caught these words in
Spanish: "If you offer a large reward? Say
four thousand reals! Consider, gentlemen,
four thousand reals for an hour's work!"

My feet seemed rooted to the ground, and 1
felt my face flush while I listened, as if life
depended on my overhearing what followed.

"We shall not find a man, bid what we may,"
said another voice, despondently; "no one not
tired of his life would run the risk, and, Caramba!
what will the people say? There will be a riot,
and our houses may pay for it. Only think
what will be the fury of the thousands up
yonder when they hear that Manuel Zagal cannot
perform at all, and that we have no matador
to take his place."

"If the idiot had but had the sense to break
his leg after the bull-fight instead of before!"
said a third speaker, in a whining and querulous
tone. "But, señores, what is to be done? I
would sooner pay four, ay, or six thousand reals
out of my own pocket, than be the one to tell
the people that they are to be disappointed of
the cream of the sport. They may sack our
houses in revenge, and mischief will surely be
done. What can we do? Not a matador
worth a straw within leagues, and Choco only
fit to face the young bulls, and those with the
wood on their horns. We shall have to use the
demilune, and before the captain-general, what
a disgrace!"

I began now to understand more clearly the
purport of this discourse. I knew that a
celebrated matador named Manuel Zagal had been
engaged to come over from Seville, the
headquarters of bull-fighting, to exhibit his skill in
despatching the infuriated animals that had been
previously provoked to fury by their mounted
tormentors the picadors. This man, who was
famous for skill and courage, stood so high in
his profession that it had not been thought
needful to hire any other artist in the same line,
and as matadors, like opera singers, travel from
place to place as their engagements serve, there
was no member of the guild then in Malaga.
There was, indeed, an active toreador whose
nickname of Choco was well known, but this
man, though a favourite with the mob, was more
a buffoon than a swordsman, and had neither
the dexterity nor the daring which a true
matador should possess. When a matador is
wounded, or some untoward accident prevents
the appearance of one, there is no resource but
to end the lives of the bulls by cutting off their
legs or ham-stringing them by means of a sharp
scythe on the end of a pole, called a demilune.
But this barbarous expedient seldom fails to
irritate the populace, who are displeased, not at
the cruelty of the act, but at the absence of that
risk of human life that is essential to the
excitements of the bull-ring.

In this case, I could easily divine what had
happened. The talented performer from Seville,
Señor Manuel Zagal, had met with a serious
accident, and the authorities were afraid to
announce to the people what had happened, aware
that a violent outbreak of popular wrath would
ensue. As for the speakers, by moving forward
a step I could see them. Two were in civil
uniform, the alcalde of the city, and a heavy
beetle-browed man, the corregidor of the police.
The third was a supple, deferential personage
in black, well dressed in the French style. He
was the manager of the shows.

"His excellency has arrived. I hear the
trumpets!" said the head of the police, gruffly;
"we must go and meet him, or we shall be
thought lacking in respect. Pity there is no
time to find a substitute; but who, even for
four thousand reals, would face our two best
bulls—the black Portuguese and the brindled
Murcian, fiercer than——"

"Make the reward five thousand reals, and I
am your man, noble señores," said I, with sudden
resolution, emerging from my hiding-place. Had
I risen, like a theatrical spectre, through a
trapdoor, my appearance could not have created
greater consternation. The corregidor was the
first to recover his equanimity. He knit his
heavy brows into a dark frown, and angrily
demanded who I might be.

"Henry West, British subject, mate of the
ship Tudor, now in port," was my answer;
"ready to be your matador to-day, if you will
raise the pay to five thousand reals."

An animated discussion then took place. The
idea of a sailor, an Englishman, undertaking the
difficult and perilous task of bull killing—for the
matador, as is well known, is the only person
exposed to real danger—seemed absurd. But
then, it was shrewdly observed by Don Ramon,
the alcalde, if I chose to get gored to death it
was no concern of theirs, and the catastrophe
would at least put the people in good humour.
But the worthy magistrate was reluctant to give
so much as five thousand reals. If I would
accept three thousand, or even four?

But I was firm. Five thousand or nothing