The Price of Eggs

At high noon one day last week, a throng of angry housewives, their market baskets under their arms, tramped along Pamplona's main street, the Paseo de Sarasate. The price of eggs had gone up from 30 to 43 -c- a dozen over the weekend. "To the governor's palace!" cried the women. "We won't stand for this any longer . . . Hang the black marketeers!"

Flying Omelets. As the women reached the governor's palace, the gates were hastily bolted, and nervous guards lined up.

One woman threw an egg, splashed the light grey uniform of a guard. Other women, reaching into their baskets for ammunition, joined in the barrage. Women with empty baskets scurried to nearby markets, helped themselves to precious eggs while outraged dealers protested. Soon stones were mixed in the flying omelets; palace windows were shattered. Police reinforcements charged up, and the women retreated to their homes through narrow streets, overturning every vegetable and fruit stand they found on the way.

That afternoon, Pamplona, scene of the country's wildest bullfights and heart of monarchist, anti-Communist Spain, was tied up by a general strike, the latest in a series of strikes that has swept Spain this spring (TIME, March 19).

Pamplona's governor issued an ultimatum to the workers: back to work by 2 p.m. or be fired. Nobody went back. Rather than fire 20,000 workers (every third person in Pamplona), the governor decided to forget his threat. On the third day of the strike, 5,000 Pamplonians tried to set fire to the government office in charge of food rationing. Civil Guards fired into the air, but wounded six people. That afternoon, for the first time in twelve years, a committee of workers met with officials of the government-controlled trade unions and government representatives. The government backed down, agreed to 1) an increase in food rations, 2) pay for all strikers and no reprisals, 3) release of some 300 arrested strikers.

"Strikes Are a Crime." On Sunday, Pamplona was calm and its coffeehouses and movies were open for business. As the new week began, Francisco Franco emerged from his closely guarded El Pardo palace on the outskirts of Madrid and for the first time made a public reference to the unrest: "Strikes are a crime . . . This is the law of jungles and primitive societies." He promised loans to farmers to increase production and lower food prices.

Franco's move seemed feeble in the face of the people's growing defiance. Spanish towns were flooded with clandestine handbills urging organized protests against the high cost of living. A 24-hour strike was called in Madrid for May 22. Spain seemed to have shed some of the fear that had kept it silent for twelve years.

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