WITH EARS
By HELEN SIMPSON IT was a kind of literary snobbery that impelled me to buy the Spanish newspaper, a special number concerned with the tercentenary of Lope de Vega. I knew nothing of Lope save his name, and the purchase of the newspaper was an act designed to impress my friends who should see it, subsequently, lying casually on my piano. Yet this was not the whole motive. Some stirring of conscience there was too, an impulse to keep up Spanish, which I knew to be for my good and obeyed ; as a child in a restaurant will sometimes, from the menu's hundred temptations, choose spinach. Having dealt with Lope—chiefly, it must be allowed, by way of the illustrations—I passed on to advertisements. These are much the same in all languages, and to peruse them gives a pleasant sense of having mastered the idiom ; though, being concerned for the most part with such intimate matters as inadequate physical develop- . ment or failures of elimination, they are even less useful, when it conies to conversation, than the traditional Pen of the gardener's aunt. Still, they give confidence ; and flushed with this I began to read an account of the recent bull-fight in Almeria, which turned out to be the poor little spinach-impulse's reward.
Manolo and Pepe Bienvenida were the toreros ; between them they despatched six bulls. The reporting of these encounters was vivacious, clouded for me now and then by technical terms as to whose significance the dictionary was mute. The bulls, very properly, ca me in for their share of commendation or blame. One was braVe and powerful, one fat and none too spirited, the third negro, y de preciosa lamina, which I take to Mean black, but comely in the truest requirements of the ring, being adorned with courage as with studs of silver, and having horns like young cedars in Lebanon. It was upon this bull that Bienvenida. lavished his prettiest skill. A wind was blowing, which made accurate Play with the muleta difficult ; but the astonishing Pepe contrived so to manipulate it, drawing the bull towards him, that their movements kept time with the phrases of the band. As an exhibition of sheer footwork and timing it was, said the reporter, una preciosidad. The bull, thus played, began to tire ; the fighter prepared for the kill. But their audience shouted that the inter- esting performance should continue, to which Bienvenida agreed, after, we may suppose, a glance of consultation With his fellow-artist, the bull. A few more passes, to great clapping ; and then a great volapie—which the dictionary describes as a feat in bull-fighting, half running, half flying—followed by a stroke which killed instantly, brought the show to its end. The • reporter, who had sowed in brackets throughout his ac(croaulnt,st(oii;hl indicate the growing excitement, words such as (Palms) (Applause) (Ovation) came to a halt upon this zenith of ecstasy ; ovation grande, orejas, y el delirio. (Great ovation, ears, and delirium.) Sporting journalism in this country has, I think, some- thing to learn ; and sporting practice too. It seems to me iniquitous that gentlemen should be paid for telling their public that whatever beats Big Boy for the 3.30 w ill Win ; iniquitous that brackets indicating applause or its contrary should be confined to reports of debates in the Rouse of Commons. Our national hypocrisy will not alloW 'us to admit that modern cricket has become, to all intents, a blood sport, but I believe that the time is not far distant when victorious Test players' trophies will include ears detached from selectors of the beaten team, aS Bienvenida took those of his defeated bull.
This would be a good move, froth the point of view of those who wish to see cricket returned to its throne as the king of English games. What is the lure which brings crowds to every speedway in the country ? The hope that there will be a crash, in which somebody unrelated to the onlookers will get spectactularly hurt, (I dismiss for the moment the question of money, though I am aware that the laying on of odds has superseded the laying on of hands as a sacred rite.) i There is in this country, as n most others, a tendency whose significance may be.foand hanging from the Golden Bough ; the wish to see every game as a religious cere- mony, a ritual finding its consummation in sacrifice. In a boxing encounter the victim discovers himself ; hunting offers up the fox, together with such broken collar-bones, ribs, and legs as its followers may contribute in the course of a run. Football has its contusions, satisfactory enough, though not wholly adequate. as a substitute for blood. But how are we to put life into cricket, croquet, bowls ? The answer comes as a paradox ; by putting death. into them. If there maid be, at the end of such sports due seasons, some appro- priate sacrifice upon their smooth green lawns ; a Holo- caust of selectors, a retired Major bludgeoned with mallets, a few licensed victuallers suspended in a burning basket above their god, the immutable milk-white jack ; if this could, be done, the reporters and sports corre- spondents might begin to earn their money again. " Well-known players were beaten in the Farthing Bay golf tournament yesterday. Miss K. Slapp laid the Essex champion, Mrs. Loudwater, a stymie at the ninth (cheers) and went on to win, 8 and 7. (Jolly Good Fellow and big toe.)" Yes, surely it must come.
Previous page
