"Before I passed the limits of the borough, a parachute, containing an animal, was dropped, which descended fast and steady, and, just as it reached the earth, my aerial ship entered a dense black body of clouds. Ten minutes were consumed in penetrating this dismal ocean of rainy vapor, occasionally meeting with great chasms, ravines, and defiles, of different shades of light and darkness. When I emerged from this ocean of clouds, a new and wonderfully magnificent scene greeted my eyes. A faint sunshine shed its warmth and luster over the surface of this vast cloud sea. The balloon rose more rapidly after it got above it. Viewing it from an elevation above the surface, I discovered it to present the same shape of the earth beneath, developing mountains and valleys, corresponding to those on the earth's surface. The profile of the cloud-surface was more depressed than that on the earth, and, in the distance of the cloud-valley a magnificent sight presented itself. Pyramids and castles, rocks and reefs, icebergs and ships, towers and domes--every thing belonging to the grand and magnificent could be seen in this distant harbor; the half-obscured sun shedding his mellow light upon it, gave it a rich and dazzling luster. They were really "castles in the air," formed of the clouds. Casting my eyes upward, I was astonished in beholding another cloud-stratum, far above the lower one; it was what is commonly termed a "mackerel sky," the sun faintly shining through it. The balloon seemed to be stationary; the clouds above and below appeared to be quiescent; the air castles, in the distance, stood to their places; silence reigned supreme; it was solemnly sublime. Solitary and alone in a mansion of the skies, my very soul swelled with emotion; I had no companion to pour out my feelings to. Great God, what a scene of grandeur! Such were my thoughts; a reverence for the works of nature, an admiration indescribable. The solemn grandeur--the very stillness that surrounded me--seemed to make a sound of praise. "This was a scene such that I never beheld one before or after exactly like it. Two perfect layers of clouds, one not a mile above the earth; the other, about a mile higher; and, between the two, a clear atmosphere, in the midst of which the balloon stood quietly in space. It was, indeed, a strange sight--a meteorological fact, which we cannot possibly see or make ourselves acquainted with, without soaring above the surface of the earth." (History and Practice of Aeronautics, p. 209).