Swallow it dog

A kneeling, supplicant man in the centre of the composition, slightly offset to the right, is surrounded by clerics. The one in the foreground, his face wild-eyed and his mouth open as if he were screaming, carries a huge syringe with which he threatens the unwary man. Another figure is holding him, while one in the background laughs, and two others at the sides seem to be watching the scene impassively. In the background, in the semi-darkness, several menacing-looking animal heads can be seen.

Goya used three-tone aquatint, which contrasts with the varnish reserves in the whites, especially in the figure holding the syringe, and he used drypoint in the veiled figure.

The Ayala manuscript describes this print as follows: "Some friars are trying to cure a poor Marcos, by hanging a relic around his neck and forcibly washing him". The one in the Prado Museum notes: "He who lives among men was irremediably stigmatised: if he wants to avoid it, he will have to go and live in the mountains, and when he is there he will also know that living alone is a geringa". Finally, the manuscript in the National Library refers to this print with the following comment: "A certain Juan Lanas is not given a bad wash by some friars who flirt with his wife and put a taleguillo around his neck as a relic to cure him and keep him quiet. The woman is seen behind covered with a veil and a monster with enormous antlers presides over the performance, with our Father Prior authorising it all".

Nigel Glendinning believes that the source of inspiration for this engraving could be found in some handwritten Tenths in Seville, of which several versions circulated, which relate a well-known anecdote of the time: the rivalry between an officer and a friar for the favours of a married woman. One day the officer goes to his beloved's house and finds her with the friar, to which the friar threatens to give her an enema, finally pulling out a pistol and having a maid give her not one but three. Thus the friar with the syringe would be identified with the friar in the story, the kneeling man with the officer and the veiled figure in the background with the woman. Behind the group stands an owl with its wings spread between the horns of a monstrous being that would symbolise the woman's husband or her lover. This creature has a large snout reminiscent of a phallus and next to it a face with a dog-like appearance and human reminiscences.

The title of the print has a double meaning, as the victim has no choice but to endure what is happening to her. The word "tragala" remained at the time an offensive term in the political vocabulary of 19th-century revolts. It was also included in liberal songs critical of the absolutist governments in power.