The Spanish Bull-Fight 195 



festivals held to celebrate the birth of his eldest son, afterwards 

 Phillip 11. 



Ill 1612 bull- fighting first assumed a financial aspect. Phillip 

 III. conceded to one Arcania Manduno the emoluments accruing 

 durino- the term of three lives from the corridas de toros in the 

 city of Valencia. Charities and asylums benefited under this 

 fund, but the bulk went in payment for professional services in 

 the Plaza. 



During the reign of Phillip IV. — that king being skilled in 

 the use of lance and javelin [rcjdn), and frequently himself taking 

 a public part — i\\e, fiesta advanced enormously in national estima- 

 tion. English readers may recall the sumptuous corrida which 

 marked the arrival of Charles I., with the Duke of Buckingham, 

 at Madrid. 



Later, during the reigns of the House of Austria, to face a 

 bull with bravery and skill and to use a dexterous lance was the 

 pride of every Spanish noble. 



Phillip v., however, would have none of the spectacle, and 

 then the nobility held aloof from the corridas ; but their 

 example proved no deterrent. For the hold of the national 

 pastime on the Moro-hispanic race was too firm-set to be swept 

 aside by alien influence, however strong ; and when thus abandoned 

 by the patricians, the hidalgos and grandees of Spain, the sport 

 of bull-fighting (hitherto confined exclusively to the aristocracy) 

 was' taken up by the Spanish people. A further impulse was 

 generated later on under Ferdinand VII., who obtained a reversal 

 of the anathema of the Church on condition that some of the 

 pecuniary profits of the corridas should swell the funds of the 

 hospitals. 



It was, however, during the first half of the eighteenth century 

 that bull-fighting on a popular basis, as understood and practised 

 at the present day, took its start. Then there stepped upon the 

 enclosed arena the first professional Torero amidst thrilling 

 plaudits from tier above tier of encircling humanity. Never 

 before had the bull been taken on by a single man on foot armed 

 only with his good sword and scarlet flag — with these to pit his 

 strength and skill against the weight and ferocity of a toro bravo — 

 alone and unaided to despatch him. Such a man was Francisco 

 Romero, ere whiles a shoemaker at Ronda — a.d. 172G — first pro- 

 fessional lidiador. On his death at an advanced age, he left 



