[5] The epistles, written and performed in different styles, from drinking songs and laments to pastorales, paint a complex picture of the life of the city during the 18th century.

A frequent theme is the demimonde, with Fredman's cheerfully drunk Order of Bacchus,[6] a loose company of ragged men who favour strong drink and prostitutes.

At the same time as depicting this realist side of life, Bellman creates a rococo picture, full of classical allusion, following the French post-Baroque poets.

The women, including the beautiful Ulla Winblad, are "nymphs", while Neptune's festive troop of followers and sea-creatures sport in Stockholm's waters.

Bellman's English biographer, Paul Britten Austin, states that the song was first performed at Lissander's, late in 1769, at a meeting of the Order of Bacchus.

Remote and strange, they echo a primitive realm where Eros and Thanatos alone reign over human fate—one outpost, one might say, of Bellman's ever-shifting mood.

In Lönnroth's view, it is perhaps the finest of Bellman's Order of Bacchus pieces, and the first to combine burlesque situation comedy with magnificent music.

Lönnroth writes that its description of Lundholm's corpse parodies Favart's text, which amorously described the youthful beauty of the fifteen year old Annette.

In place of the shepherdess's kissable mouth and fresh skin, Bellman portrays the aged brandy-distiller's crumbling state, stinking of alcohol.

Lönnroth comments that this was the first time that Bellman had managed, as Oxenstierna had observed, to unite the "ridiculous" with the "sublime", parodying both the comic opera of the song's tune and Sweden's noble Orders.