topped their operation simply because he had been to London. No doubt,
as we have already more than hinted, he was roused and stimulated by the
new scenes and the unfamiliar modes of life which he saw and experienced
in England. His temporary release from the fetters of official life had
also an exhilarating influence. So much we learn indeed from himself.
Thus, writing from London to Frau von Genzinger, he says: "Oh, my dear,
good lady, how sweet is some degree of liberty! I had a kind prince, but
was obliged at times to be dependent on base souls. I often sighed for
freedom, and now I have it in some measure. I am quite sensible of this
benefit, though my mind is burdened with more work. The consciousness of
being no longer a bond-servant sweetens all my toils." If this liberty,
this contact with new people and new forms of existence, had come to
Haydn twenty years earlier, it might have altered the whole current of
his career. But it did not help him much in the actual composition of
"The Creation," which he found rather a tax, alike on his inspiration
and his physical powers. Writing to Breitkopf & Hartel on June 12, 1799,
he says: "The world daily pays me many compliments, even on the fire of
my last works; but no one could believe the strain and effort it costs
me to produce these, inasmuch as many a day my feeble memory and the
unstrung state of my nerves so completely crush me to the earth, that
I fall into the most melancholy condition, so much so that for days
afterwards I am incapable of finding one single idea, till at length
my heart is revived by Providence, when I seat myself at the piano and
begin once more to hammer away at it. Then all goes well again, God be
praised!"

Self-Criticism

In the same letter he remarks that, "as for myself, now an old man, I
hope the critics may not handle my 'Creation' with too great severity,
and be too hard on it. They may perhaps find the musical orthography
faulty in various passages, and perhaps other things also which I have
for so many years been accustomed to consider as minor points; but the
genuine connoisseur will see the real cause as readily as I do, and will
willingly cast aside such stumbling blocks." It is impossible to miss
the significance of all this.

[At this point in the original book, a facsimile of a letter regarding
"The Creation" takes up the entire next page.]

Certainly it ought to be taken into account in any critical estimate
of "The Crea