Flaming posters announced that six champions of the Miura breed would face the swordsmen. The occasion was unique, and D. Eduardo Miura rose to meet it, presenting six bulls of incomparable beauty, magnificent in fine lines, in dash, brute-strength, and valour, yet utterly devoid (as the event proved) of guile or lurking treachery. Such animals as these six demanded a Romero, a Montes, or a Guerrita as equals; instead, these young _Toréros_ who faced them, courageous though they were, lacked calibre for such an undertaking. This _corrida_ marked an epoch, but it acquired the proportions of a catastrophe. The bye-word that "where there are bulls there are no matadors" became that afternoon an axiom. A _gettatura_, or atmosphere of superstition, surrounded the bulls and unnerved or confounded their opponents. Pepete was caught by the first bull, Moréno de Alcalá by the fourth, while Martin Vasquez (already thrice caught) succumbed to the fifth. The sixth bull thus remained unopposed champion of the Plaza--not a matador survived to face him, and it became necessary to entice an unfought bull (by means of trained oxen) to quit the arena--an event unprecedented in the age-long annals of Tauromachy! A typical incident, trivial by comparison, intervened. A youthful spectator, frenzied to madness by the scene, had seized a sword, leapt into the ring, and ... promptly met his death. * * * * * Every contention of the bull-fighters' guild had been falsified, and the association collapsed. A Sevillian paper summed up the event thus:-- The six bulls were each worthy to figure in toromaquian annals for their beautiful stamp, their lines, weight, bravery, and caste. We witnessed a tragedy when, on the death of the fifth bull, not a matador remained. But had that tragedy been caused by malice, wickedness, or treachery on the part of the bulls, surely a declaration of martial law in this city would have been demanded by not a few! But that was not so; each of the six competed in the qualities of bravery, nobility, and adaptability--such bulls are worthy of better swordsmen. CHAPTER XX SIERRA DE GRÉDOS We met, our trio, on the platform of Charing Cross--not classic but perhaps historic ground, since so many notable expeditions have started therefrom, with others of less importance.