Many years later, in his autobiographical essay “Campaign in France”, he declared that he had seen a vulture "in the gloomy snow-capped clouds that rose from the north" on the Ettersberg, and that he had already begun the poem that day.
Viele Jahre später erklärte er in seiner autobiographischen Schrift Kampagne in Frankreich, am Ettersberg einen Geier „im düstern und von Norden her sich heranwälzenden Schneegewölk“ gesehen und an diesem Tag das Gedicht bereits begonnen zu haben.