By 1790, Haydn has become dissatisfied with life at Eszterhaza. On 9th February he wrote:
Well! I sit in my wilderness; forsaken, like some poor orphan, almost without human society; melancholy, dwelling on the memory of past glorious days. Yes; past, alas! And who can tell when these happy hours may return? Those charming meetings? Where the whole circle have but one heart and one soul – all those delightful musical evenings, which can only be remembered, and not described. Where are all those inspired moments? All gone – and gone for long … I found everything at home in confusion; for three days I did not know whether I was capell master or capell servant; nothing could console me; my apartments were all in confusion; my pianoforte, that I formerly loved so dearly, was perverse and disobedient, and rather irritated rather than soothed me, for, while asleep I was under the pleasant delusion that I was listening to the opera Le Nozze di Figaro [The Marriage of Figaro], when the blustering north wind woke me, and almost blew my nightcap off my head.
Landon, H. C. Robbins (1955) The Symphonies of Joseph Haydn.