Clouds are often seen to advantage in mountainous countries. Here the aspect of the heavens may be entirely different at different elevations. A single cloud in the valley may conceal the whole of the upper sky from an observer; but as he ascends he may gradually get above this and other layers or bands of cloud, and see a beautifully variegated sky above him, while the clouds which conceal the valley may be rolling at his feet. Evelyn, in his Memoirs, notices a scene of this kind. He says,—“Next morning we rode by Monte Pientio, or, as vulgarly called, Monte Mantumiato, which is of an excessive height, ever and anon peeping above airy clouds with its snowy head, till we had climbed to the inn at Radicofany, built by Ferdinand the greate Duke for the necessary refreshment of travellers in so inhospitable a place. As we ascended we entered a very thick, solid, and dark body of cloudes, which looked like rocks at a little distance, which lasted neare a mile in going up; they were dry, misty vapours, hanging undissolved for a vast thicknesse, and obscuring both sun and earth, so that we seemed to be in the sea rather than in the cloudes, till, having pierced through it, we came into a most serene heaven, as if we had been above all human conversation, the mountain appearing more like a great island than joyn’d to any other hills, for we could perceive nothing but a sea of very thick cloudes rowling under our feete like huge waves, every now and then suffering the top of some other mountain to peepe through, which we could discover many miles off: and betweene some breaches of the cloudes we could see landskips and villages of the subjacent country. This was one of the most pleasant, newe, and altogether surprising objects that I had ever beheld.” In the following interesting account of the ascent of the Peak of Teneriffe by Captain Basil Hall, it will be seen that heavy rain clouds may skirt the mountain, while its summit is in a pure and dry air. “On the 24th of August,” he says, “we left Oratava to ascend the Peak. The day was the worst possible for our purpose, as it rained hard; and was so very foggy that we could not see the Peak, or indeed any object beyond one hundred yards distant.