Theatrical representations have always been a very popular form of recreation among the inhabitants of the Iberian continent, from the days when the plays were acted by itinerant performers, "carrying all their properties in a sack, the stage consisting of four wooden benches, covered with rough boards, a blanket suspended at the back, to afford a green-room, in which some musician sang, without accompaniment, old ballads to enliven the proceedings." This is Cervantes's description of the national stage in the time of his immediate predecessor, Lope de Rueda. The Spanish _zarzuela_ appears to have been the forerunner and origin of all musical farce and "opera comique," only naturalised in our country during the present generation. The theatres in all the provinces are always full, always popular; the pieces only run for short periods, a perpetual variety being aimed at by the managers--a thing easily to be understood when one remembers that the same audience, at any rate in the boxes and stalls, frequent them week in, week out. In Madrid, with a population of five hundred thousand inhabitants, there are nineteen theatres. With the exception of the first-class theatres, the people pay two _reales_ (_5 d._) for each small act or piece, and the audience changes many times during the evening, a constant stream coming and going. Long habit and familiarity with good models have made the lower class of playgoers critical; their judgment of a piece, or of an actor, is always good and worth having. The religious _fiestas_ must also count among the amusements of the people in Spain. Whether it be the Holy Week in Seville or Toledo, the _Romería_ of Santiago, the _Veladas_, or vigils, of the great festivals, or the day of Corpus Christi, which takes place on the first Thursday after Trinity Sunday--at all these the people turn out in thousands, dressed in their smartest finery, and combine thorough enjoyment with the performance of what they believe to be a religious duty. There is little or no drunkenness at these open-air festivities, but much gaiety, laughter, fluttering of fans, "throwing of sparks" from mischievous or languishing eyes--and at the end always a bull-fight.