Bronco: a bull that is savage, nervous, uncertain and difficult.
Buey: steer or ox; or a bull which is heavy and oxlike in his actions.
Bulto: bundle; the man rather than the cloth. A bull that makes for the bundle is one that pays no attention to the cape or muleta no matter how well managed, but goes after the man instead. A bull that does this nearly always has been fought before either on the ranch as a calf or, contrary to the regulations, has appeared in some village ring without being killed.
Burladero: a shelter of planks set close together and a little out from the corral or barrera behind which the bullfighters and herders can dodge if pursued.
Burriciegos: bulls with defective vision. Either far-sighted, near-sighted or simply hazy visioned. Near-sighted bulls can be fought well by a bullfighter who is not afraid to get close and by turning with the bull keep him from losing sight of the lure when he turns. Far-sighted bulls are very dangerous since they will charge suddenly and with great speed from an abnormal distance at the largest object that attracts their attention. Hazy-visioned bulls, often caused by their eyes becoming congested during the fight, when the bull is overweight and the day is hot, or, from driving into and scattering the visceral content of a horse over them, are almost impossible to do any brilliant work with.
C
Caballero en Plaza: a Portuguese or Spanish mounted bullfighter riding trained, blooded horses who, aided by one or more men on foot with capes who help place the bull for him, puts in banderillas with either one or both hands and kills the bull with a javelin from on horseback. These riders are also called rejoneadores from the rejón or javelin they use. These are razor-sharp, narrow, dagger-shaped lance points which are on a shaft which has been partially cut through to weaken it so that the point can be driven in by a straight thrust and the long shaft then broken off in order that the point will remain in the wound sinking deeper as the bull tosses his head and often killing him from what seems a slight thrust. The equestrian ability required for this form of bullfighting is very great and the manoeuvres are complicated and difficult, but after you have seen it a few times, it lacks the appeal of the ordinary bullfight since the man undergoes no danger. It is the horse that takes the risks, not the rider; since the horse is in motion whenever he approaches the bull and any wound he may receive through his rider’s lack of judgment or skill will not be of a sort to bring him to the ground and expose the rider. The bull too is bled and rapidly exhausted by the deep lance wounds which are often made in the forbidden territory of the neck. Also since the horse, after the first twenty yards, can always outdistance the bull it becomes a chase of an animal of superior speed by one less fast in the course of which the pursuing animal is stabbed from horseback. This is altogether opposed to the theory of the bullfight on foot in which the bullfighter is supposed to stand his ground while the bull attacks him and deceive the animal by a movement of a cloth held in his arms. In bullfighting on horseback the man uses the horse as a lure to draw the bull’s charge, often approaching the bull from the rear, but the lure is always in motion and I find the business, the more I see of it, very dull. The horsemanship is always admirable, and the degree of training of the horses amazing, but the whole thing is closer to the circus than it is to formal bullfighting.
Caballo: horse. Picadors’ horses are also called pencos or more literarily rocinantes and a variety of names which correspond to our calling poor race horses, skins, skates, dogs, etc.
Cabestros: the trained steers used in handling fighting bulls. The older and more experienced these are the greater their value and usefulness.
Cabeza: head.
Cabeza á rabo: a pase in which the bull passes his entire length under the muleta from head to tail.
Cabezada: a toss of the head.
Cachete: another name for the despatching of the bull with the puntilla once he has gone to the ground.
Cachetero: one who gives the coup de grace with the puntilla.
Caída: fall of a picador when his horse is knocked over by the bull. Sword thrusts which are placed lower toward the neck than they should be without being intentionally bajonazos are also called caída.
Calle: street; the worst bullfighters are usually the ones seen most constantly on the street. It is implied in Spain that some one seen always on the street has no better place to go or, if he has, is unwelcome there.
Callejón: the passage way between the wooden fence or barrera which surrounds the ring and the first row of seats.
Cambio: change. A pase with the cape or muleta in which the bullfighter after taking the bull’s charge into the cloth changes the animal’s direction with a movement of the cloth so that where the animal would have passed to one side of the man he is made to pass on the other side. The muleta may also be changed from one hand to the other in a cambio, doubling the bull on himself to fix him in place. Sometimes the man will change the muleta from hand to hand behind his back. This is merely ornamental and without effect on the bull. The cambio in banderillas is a feint made by the body to change the bull’s direction; it has been fully described in the text.
Camelo: fake; a bullfighter who by tricks tries to appear to work close to the bull while in reality never taking any chances.
Campo: the country. Faenas del campo are all the operations in the breeding, branding, testing, herding, selecting, caging and shipping of the bulls from the ranches.
Capa or capote: the cape used in bullfighting. Shaped like the capes commonly worn in Spain in the winter, it is usually made of raw silk on one side and percale on the other, heavy, stiff and reinforced in the collar, cerise colored on the outside and yellow on the inner side. A good fighting cape costs 250 pesetas. They are heavy to hold and at the lower extremities small corks have been stitched into the cloth of the capes the matadors use. These the matador holds in his hands when he lifts the lower ends of the cape and gathers them together for handholds when swinging the cape with both hands.
Caparacón: the mattresslike covering for the chest and belly of a picador’s horse.
Capea: informal bullfights or bull baitings in village squares in which amateurs and aspirant bullfighters take part. Also a parody of the formal bullfight given in parts of France or where the killing of the bull is prohibited in which no picadors are used and the killing of the bull is simulated.
Capilla: the chapel in the bull ring where the bullfighters may pray before entering the ring.
Capote de brega: the fighting cape as above described.
Capote de paseo: the luxurious cape the bullfighter wears into the ring. These are heavily brocaded with gold or silver and cost from fifteen hundred to five thousand pesetas.
Cargar la suerte: the first movement of the arms made by the matador when the bull reaches the cloth to move the lure ahead of the bull and send him away from the man.
Carpintero: bull ring carpenter who waits in the callejón ready to repair any damage to the barrera or gates of the ring.
Carril: a rut, furrow or railway track; a carril in bullfighting is a bull that charges perfectly straight as though coming down a groove or mounted on rails, permitting the utmost in brilliance to the matador.
Cartel: the composed programme for a bullfight. May also mean the amount of popularity a bullfighter has in any determined locality. For instance, you ask a friend in the business, “What cartel have you in Malaga?” “Wonderful; in Malaga no one has more cartel than me. My cartel is unmeasurable.” As a matter of record on his last appearance in Malaga he may have been chased out of the city by angry and disappointed customers.
Carteles: the posters announcing a bullfight.
Castigaderas: the long poles used from above in herding and sorting the bulls into the various runways and passages of the corrals when placing them in their compartments before the fight.
Castoreno: or beavers: the wide hats with pompons at the side worn by the picador.
Cazar: to kill the bull deceitfully and treacherously with the sword without the man allowing his body to come close to the horn.
Ceñido: close to the bull.
Ceñirse: to close in on. Applied to the bull it means those which pass as close to the man as he will permit, gaining a little ground each attack. The man is said to ciñe when he works very close to the animal.
Cerca: close; as in close to the horns.
Cerrar: to shut in. Cerrar el toro: to bring the bull close into the barrera; the opposite of Abrir. The bullfighter is called encerrado en Tablas when he has provoked the charge of the bull close to the barrera so that the bull cuts off his retreat on one side and the barrera cuts it on the other.
Cerveza: beer; there is good draft beer almost anywhere in Madrid, but the best is found at the Cervezeria Alvarez in the calle Victoria. Draft
