ANIMALS AS PRIZE-FIGHTERS 43 



the lower creatures receive the humane treatment 

 which is due to them, and it is to be hoped that the 

 so-caUed sport of buU-fighting, which is still a 

 national form of amusement in Spain, will soon be 

 but a memory of the past. 



The animals used in bull-fighting are a distinct 

 breed which, since the thirteenth century, has been 

 specially reared by careful selection with a view to 

 producing a stock of cattle possessing the qualities 

 of speed, endiu"ance, and courage to a marked 

 degree. Mr. Philip Larcon, in an interesting article 

 upon the Spanish fighting-buU, states : — ' To trace 

 the rise of bull-fighting in the Peninsula we must 

 go back to the eighth century, when the Christian 

 knights adopted the custom from their Moorish 

 conquerors. It was the habit of these latter to 

 maintain their skill in arms and to train their sons 

 to war by baiting the wild bulls which roamed free 

 on the vast and uncultivated plains of Iberia.' 

 In those days, however, buU-fighting was very 

 different to what it is at the present day, and was 

 purely a test of skill and agility between man and 

 beast, and lacked the glitter, organised and bloody 

 sensationahsm, and sheer brutality which nowadays 

 robs the practice of any right that it might have 

 had in the past to be classified as a sport. The 

 education of the buUs destined for fighting com- 

 mences when they are a year old, and those which 

 show signs of cowardice are promptly sold and fre- 

 quently pass the rest of their lives puUing the plough ; 

 but those animals which prove to be courageous 

 remain at the farm for another year, when they 



