Familiar folly

On the right of the composition, two scarecrows dressed as soldiers stand menacingly before a group of people. One of them is holding a sabre tied to one of his branches, as if calling for a charge. A crowd jeers in front of them. At the head of the group is a figure who confronts the warlike wimps, either out of bravery or because he is the only one who has realised that they are not real soldiers. He presides over the foreground in a salient luminosity. He whistles at them with one hand over his mouth and mocks them by putting the other on his backside. The rest of the characters are arranged at a certain safe distance, hidden in the shadows, depicted according to Goya's sense of mass. They appear huddled and self-conscious with an icy smile on their lips. The figure in profile on the far left has a simian face and is dressed in 19th-century style, with a cloak and low-crowned hat.

The memory of the War of Independence lives on in a town punished by the continuous threat of horror and death. The contempt for the Napoleonic army is something that continues to live on many years after the end of the occupation.

The imposing lighting, which focuses on the figures in the foreground, contrasts with the dark figures in the background. The aquatint achieves a graduated inking that accentuates the effects of light and shadow.