We visited Spain August about 1967. We had the great luck to visit a friend there from the states who had been studying history there and whose Spanish was fluent. We were stationed in Madrid but decided to see a bull fight in a small town some 40 kilometers south of Madrid. We were a bit late and parked in a field under shade trees not far from the bull ring. As we walked towards the ring several boys ran along beside us trying to sell us tickets. I would have been unable to speak to them and also unlikely to trust them. My friend had had experience with them however and bargained with them for seats on the shady side of the ring. We got tickets for what seemed to me to be a reasonable price and indeed the tickets were as advertised. We did not stop even briefly to do the deal. We were in our seats within five minutes of parking the car.

I was impressed with the efficiency of the operation and the low cost of the transaction. The ring was mostly full of spectators. I can’t recall any other occasion of buying tickets so efficiently.

This seems on the surface to be a sign of a very civil society—the sort which bodes well for commerce. Perhaps there was an oppressive culture or police activity behind the scenes but I did not sense it. (This was Franco’s Spain.) My impression was that the boys were free agents.

Another Spanish bull fight anecdote may be instructive. This time the fight was in Madrid. As we drove to the ring most traffic was going our way. The street was three lanes in either direction. First the taxies, and then other cars comandered another lane so that four lanes were going our way. I could see no resulting problems.