2 20 The Course, the Camp, the Chase 



voices was so great that he could distinguish nothing that 

 was said, as he would have done had but one person alone 

 called out to him. Just when the excitement was at its 

 height, when the bull was scarcely a yard away, coming at 

 full gallop in a headlong charge from behind, Frascuelo 

 apparently heard its approach. He gave a sudden start, 

 looked hurriedly over his shoulder, and instantly stiffening 

 into a statue, turned his body sideways to his assailant, at 

 the same time leaning over backwards as far as he could. 

 The action was so instantaneous that it took far less time 

 to accomplish than to relate it, and almost simultaneously 

 the bull's right horn caught the epaulette on Frascuelo's 

 left shoulder, ripping the whole of his clothes off his chest 

 and leaving the skin bare, but without actually touching 

 him. The scene that followed is impossible to describe. 

 The enthusiasm was intense, and the matador's fame rose 

 to a higher pitch than ever. 



These are the feats that are so powerfully attractive, 

 and a bull-fight never takes place, where the bulls are 

 good and the bull-fighters first-rate, without a certainty of 

 someone being killed, if he were not saved either by his 

 own presence of mind, or the skill and courage of others. 

 And yet fatal accidents are very rare. Often and often it 

 flashes across j^our mind, that someone must be killed 

 unless someone else can possibly do a given action, and, 

 almost before the thought has formed in your mind, that 

 someone has bounded to the spot and done that very 

 action. " Viva, viva, magnifico, mnsica ! " 



