Beethoven asks his brother Johann to come to visit him. Beethoven had found several faults with the lodgings his brother had rented for him and into which he had just moved. He asks Johann for help with the complaint. Aside from the general shabbiness of the lodgings, the main problems were the owner's uncouth conduct and the stove, which smoked out the whole apartment as it did not have its own chimney.
The notes from the conversation with the journalist Sproschil on the address side refer to the smoking oven about which Beethoven had complained. Sporschil had visited Beethoven in these lodgings several times and written about it in the theatre newspaper.
