Bull-baiting, a barbarous sport, once very popular in England, and in which all classes of society delighted equally. A number of dogs were set on to attack a bull; and in order that he might be made as furious as possible, his nose was sometimes blown full of beaten pepper before he was turned loose. Another form of the sport was to fasten the bull to a stake, by a rope of some yards' length, and to set bulldogs on him, one at a time, which were trained to seize him by the nose—which, when accomplished, was called pinning the bull. But no small part of the enjoyment of the spectators was derived from the success with which the attacks of the dogs were met by the bull lowering his head to the ground, and receiving them on his horns, often tossing them to a great distance. King James I. greatly delighted in this sport; and when the Czar Nicholas of Russia visited England, before his accession to the empire, a boxing-match and a bull-baiting were got up to show him English tastes. Bull-baiting was declared illegal in 1835.
An equally barbarous sport, termed Bull-running, was formerly practised at Stamford and Tutbury, where men and women took the place of dogs, maddened the bull with hideous noise, and then pursued it with 'bull-clubs,' till the wretched brute sank under the blows of its assailants.